


Bronze

by mothlights



Category: Twilight - Stephenie Meyer
Genre: 21st Century, AU, Ancient History, Appalachia, BAMF Women, Bronze Age, F/M, India, Italy, Kidnapping, Meditation, Modern Era, Revenge, Romance, Sexual Content, Unresolved Sexual Tension, Vampires, Перевод на русский | Translation in Russian
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-05
Updated: 2011-05-30
Packaged: 2017-10-17 15:58:13
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 23
Words: 69,015
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/178502
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mothlights/pseuds/mothlights
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Edward is a rebellious newborn lashing out at those who try to help him. At his wits' end, Carlisle asks Isabella, the woman who was once his mentor, to take Edward in until his bloodlust cools. ExB Very AU. --- Repost from FFn.<br/>Бронза - Russian available</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Delivery

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to Belindella for the pre-read on several chapters. Thanks to my OH for occasionally brutal but always insightful comments.
> 
> All the usual characters, settings, etc. are the property of S. Meyer and Little, Brown and Company. No copyright infringement is intended, and no money is being made. Original characters and plot are mine. Copyright 2011, mothlights. May not be reprinted or reposted.
> 
>  _[Бронза](http://twilightrussia.ru/forum/112-19950-1)_ \- Russian translation by Buttercup

**PART 1**

The snap of a twig could make Edward drop low, ready to defend himself or spring on prey. Even the thimbleful of blood in a mole beneath the roots of a tree would snap him to attention. Worst of all, the thoughts of others had tested the limits of his temper until he'd lashed out, striking the woman who'd gotten too close in her attempt to calm him – Carlisle's precious Esme.

Edward knew he'd crossed a line, but that didn't mean Carlisle needed to drop him off here like a package.

Carlisle's thoughts were scattered. _On my own, I could be in Denali by mid day. Esme will have healed. And then we can go home… I let it go wrong... These woods will be remote enough even for Edward, but he'll be a disruption…_

There was no pushing those thoughts away, so Edward swung his attention to the mind of the one who would soon be his keeper. Carlisle had called her Dae and Genovefa and her latest name, the name by which he had known her, Isabella. Even ten miles away, Edward could read her. She was focusing on the cool give and bristle of moss beneath her feet. Her heel came up; the air caught the moisture from the dew on her skin. Cool. Damp. Pressure. Motion. Skin and pine needles and earth. Then the smooth conformity of wood as she stepped into her house. If these wordless sensations were the only thoughts invading his mind until he mastered his godforsaken bloodlust and set out on his own, then it would be an improvement over his time in Washington.

 _If he'd just listen. If I'd been better about drawing him out…_ Carlisle was stifling in his fatherly expectation, but there was guilt there too, and there had to be a way to use that, if Edward could just figure out how. He took a deep breath, and his fingers twitched into fists.

"Are you alright?" Carlisle asked.

"Does it matter?"

"Don't be a child. No one wants you to be miserable. If you would–"

"Right. I'm fine."

Carlisle stopped, and by the time Edward slowed there was a good twenty feet between them.

"I'm doing the best I can, Edward. I don't–"

"Let's get this over with." Even being dumped with a stranger was better than another long speech. "She's just up ahead."

"You can sense her mind already?"

Edward nodded as he kicked a stone and watched it disappear into the woods, hitting a tree with a satisfying crack. Black birds flew up against the sunset in a fit of sound and motion before settling back into the leaves.

"What is she like?" Carlisle asked.

"Can't explain."

"Well, I shouldn't have asked you in the first place." But Carlisle's thoughts were filled with his longing to have her mind opened like a watch so he could see the gears and understand how she worked. "Edward, listen, try not to do anything to anger her."

"What the fuck, Carlisle?"

"And don't curse."

"She supposed to be dangerous?"

"Of course not. But she's… formidable. Just remember she's doing this as a favor. Show her some respect."

They were getting close now. She must have been able to hear them moving through the pines, though her thoughts hadn't turned their way. Maybe she was soft in the head. How else to explain the moments when there was no running commentary in her mind? But Carlisle wouldn't revere her unless she was at least his equal.

The dirt trail ended at a log cabin, and Edward shook his head. Three cabins like this could've fit inside the house in Washington.

"You can always go outside," Carlisle said. "Just stay close. If you sense a human, tell Isabella immediately."

Edward looked away. "She's here." Her thoughts had finally turned to their arrival, and he heard Carlisle's name as a word in her mind when she stepped out onto the small porch.

"Carlisle, it's good to see you."

"Thank you so much for having us."

Edward rolled his eyes at the way Carlisle seemed to make himself smaller in her presence. _Go ahead and curtsy, why don't you?_

Isabella turned to face him. The breeze was gone, and all the birds had flown, leaving the forest silent. She didn't bother to blink, but Edward found himself blinking repeatedly. He had never felt quite so looked at before. He was certain that she had a talent – maybe withering something on the spot or causing storms. Whatever it was she could do, why hadn't Carlisle told him? _Don't growl. Do not growl_ , the most basic part of him warned. He wanted to pull his arms back as far as they would go and push her through the rough logs. Instead he felt himself bending slightly, almost bowing his head.

"You're Edward." She smiled at him.

He shrank back before he realized he was moving, and then he remembered his newborn strength and her simple thoughts and made himself step forward and look at her. She was beautiful with her gold eyes and long dark hair, and even though he could've described Esme with the same words, this was different.

If Isabella noticed his reaction to her, she didn't think anything of it. He could read her mind, and yet it was as if he couldn't, or at least, she had yet to think anything that would give him a handle on how to get the upper hand.

"Come in," she said.

He followed Carlisle through the door, and was met with a larger space than he'd expected, because the room was empty. Except for crisp white curtains over the windows and an old, upright piano in the corner of the open downstairs space, there was nothing to show that anyone lived here. Carlisle sometimes worked in the community, though he hadn't been able to for the last two years, and he kept up appearances with sofas and beds and even a refrigerator. If this house in the deep backwoods of Appalachia was any indication, Isabella had little contact with the human world. He found himself approving, but only because he wouldn't have to pretend that everything was normal. They were bloodsuckers after all; why should they fill a place with the niceties of the life he'd lost in the accident?

"Thank you again for agreeing to help us," Carlisle said. "Edward and I both appreciate it."

In truth, Edward felt like Oliver Twist being sold off in front of the orphanage after one mistake. He huffed out a breath, and two faces turned to him. Again, Isabella smiled, but it did nothing to lessen his sense that she could crush him if she wanted to. Was it because of her age? Could she be as old as Carlisle said? She looked young – perhaps eighteen or nineteen – but that meant nothing. She was wearing a button up blouse and a pair of worn jeans, so her clothes held no clues. There was a chunky, dagger-like pendant around her neck, curved in the crude shape of a woman, but he couldn't place the symbol.

Carlisle's worried mind tugged at Edward while he stared, and he wondered how Esme – who was, to put it charitably, a basket case – had worked her way into Carlisle's thoughts from day one, leaving little room for anyone else.

"I'm going outside," Edward said. He dropped his duffle bag and backed toward the door.

Carlisle raised an eyebrow, but didn't comment.

"Don't worry, I won't run off and terrorize the countryside."

He was out before he could see their expressions, and though he said he wouldn't go far, there was no wildlife near the cabin. He suspected he knew why. He headed out until he caught the scent of a buck, and then he ran him down, leaping onto his back. It took a while for the life to fade from his shining black eye, and Edward drank until there was nothing left. He didn't bother to hide the carcass. This place was so remote that even hikers probably wouldn't venture here. It was just going to be him and that woman with her unfathomable thoughts and a presence that made him feel like he needed to get down on his knees. But he wouldn't. He hadn't asked for this life or her charity, and though he was stuck with both, he'd be damned if he was going to be thankful for it.


	2. Shower

It was morning, and Edward was stuck, stock still at the base of an evergreen.

Carlisle had left hours ago. He'd called out a goodbye, but when Edward didn't answer he couldn't wait; he had a flight to catch - one of the benefits of travelling without a newborn. He'd thanked Isabella yet again, and she'd told him everything would be fine. Carlisle wanted to believe her, but Edward had listened to him fret and argue with himself as he headed down the trail, his thoughts becoming quieter, a repeated refrain fading out until he was gone.

Edward had hunted again, pulled through the woods by the scent of a lame wolf, and afterwards he wasn't sure what to do, so he did nothing. He wished he had a book with him. Maybe he'd go get one from his bag. If he stayed away she'd think he was afraid to face her, or she could accuse him of sulking. He'd heard that one before, and he had a ready comeback, but once he turned his attention miles away to the house everything was forgotten.

Isabella was taking a shower.

If he'd thought her single minded focus on the sensation of walking was dull, it was only because it had not yet occurred to him that she might point that laser of attention to the rest of her body. In the water. With soap.

Most people let their thoughts wander to regrets, memories, plans for the rest of their day. He could read their minds without even knowing where they were until they woke from a daydream and noticed their surroundings. But so far Isabella had been present for everything she did, and at the moment she was rubbing a rough luffa over the thin skin above her heel and higher to the handful of firm white flesh beneath the back of her knee. Her foot was propped on the side of an old tub, and as she bent forward in her scrubbing, her breast pressed against the front of her thigh.

Wet, sudsy, cool, slick where skin met skin and abrasive wherever she drew her sponge. Edward watched through her eyes and felt with her hands. He heard a tapping sound and realized his fingers were rapping an SOS against his thigh. His breathing was shallow and faster than hers. He could tell, because she noticed her breathing. She noticed the pounding of cool water on her shoulders, and when she bent further, on the small of her back. The sensations were so clear that he almost felt wet, and he tensed to run perhaps all the way back to Forks if that's what it took. Anything to keep the truth from her, because if she knew she could bend him to her will this easily, he was done for.

She straightened, and she drew the luffa up with her, so he stayed, transfixed between two trees. The luffa brushed across the slight swell beneath her navel, the thinner skin that moved across her ribs. The cell-like spaces between luffa fibers pressed against the pads of her fingers, and her movements were steady, as though she were merely scrubbing the hull of a boat. The smell of the soap was verbena and lye. She brought the last sliver of the bar up, between her breasts, across her collar bone and around to the back of her neck. When even her soapy hand washing behind her ear caused his body to respond, he let out a growl.

He'd been aroused in his human life, but memories from before the change were muddy, distant, facts in a ledger. This was like eating fire. The bloodlust was enough without having to contend with another pull that left him dancing on a string. He would not let her bend him. Not with the way she looked at him. Not with the curve of her hips or arc of her neck. He made himself stop panting. The only way to do it was to cease breathing altogether.

After a while a few birds settled into the trees around him and began the quick, repetitive cries that marked their territory. A warbler hopped to the branch beside his head. Edward had been tensed in one position so long that it might have thought he was a stone. By the time he had settled down enough to go back to the cabin, the sun was high in the sky, and the way he hesitated like a deer as he neared the open doorway made him want to pull the bottom log from the house and watch the rest tumble down.

He stuck his head in first and found her sitting cross legged on the floor with her eyes closed. She had her hair pulled in a ponytail, and one strap of a faded lime sundress hung off her shoulder. Edward waited in the entryway, but when she didn't open her eyes, he grabbed the handle of his duffle bag and took the stairs four at a time to the second floor. There were three doors up here, plus the bath. He could still smell the soap and the damp in the air, but he stayed clear of that room.

He opened a door with a dented copper knob and found an oak desk with a pen stand and a blotter. There was a stack of old books on the floor. Just some worn paperbacks and a few hardbacks with a library stamp that said cancelled. There was a dresser that someone had painted white, but now the paint was starting to flake away. He pulled out a drawer, and mothballs rolled in circles around the empty space.

The room across the narrow hall was smaller. There was another desk in the corner, a cheap flat-pack pine box with a couple of drawers. This room had a window seat with a lid that would open, but a dark clay urn was on top of it. In the far corner a tin wash tub sat under a hole about two feet wide in the roof. Why hadn't she fixed that? The sun was casting a square of light through it and onto the wall. Opening the folding closet door, he caught the scent of cotton and verbena from her clothes. He reached out to Isabella's mind, but he was nowhere in her thoughts.

The last room was the smallest, and it was empty. He unzipped his bag and hung up a few shirts before tossing his books and pants on the floor. He didn't have much else. Just a few pairs of shoes and a garnet ring that had been his mother's. The shoes were thrown in with the rest, but with nowhere else to put it, the ring went in his pocket.

He'd explored. He'd unpacked. Now what? The timber walls pressed in around him. He ventured back downstairs to find Isabella exactly where he'd left her, and he had the strangest desire to startle her to attention. There was no television here, no radio. He didn't even know if she had electricity. Twenty minutes must have passed while she ignored him. It seemed pointless to go back upstairs or into the woods again. Then he noticed the piano in the corner. It was a squat upright with faded gold scrollwork and a plaque that said Wm. Rolfe and Sons. He sat down at the bench and flexed his hands. His mother used to make him take lessons as a child, and he remembered "Ah! Vous dirai-je, Maman" so he started to play it, surprised that his hands remembered where to go. With his new reflexes, his fingers flew so fast that to a human it would have been nothing but a buzzing blur of sound, and he hit the end of the piece in three minutes. He stopped and looked at Isabella. Nothing. If he went over and shook her, what would she do?

He started beating "Chopsticks" into the keys like a punishment, holding back just enough to not break the ivory off the tops.

No response.

He smashed keys down in a jumble of ugly sound. The high G stayed down, wouldn't spring back into place. He felt something light on his shoulder, and he leapt to grab her neck and slam her back against the wall before he knew what he was doing.

"I…" He didn't know what to say. He had his hand on Isabella, holding her at arm's length with enough force to crush the bones of anything weaker than their own kind. Something in him fought to press harder, but he stayed still, holding her by the throat. Her breathing was calm, and she didn't struggle. He was almost afraid to set her free for fear of what she might do.

"Let go, Edward." Her mind was a pillar of stone. She had absolutely no fear that he would hurt her, and not through any misguided faith in him. He was a gnat, a flea; he was nothing. He dropped his hand and fell to her feet.

"I didn't mean to," he said. "I was startled."

"Go upstairs. I'll come up to you in a minute."

He pushed himself back, and then he ran.

There was plenty of time to worry, because she went outside to a small shed in back and then started to dig in her garden. He was able to predict how her mind would focus now - the dried out wooden handle of the shovel in her hands, the resistance as it met the earth. But he was surprised at the way she jabbed it so hard into the ground. He heard a cracking sound, and felt with her as the handle broke beneath the pressure. She took the two pieces into the shed and came back with another shovel to plant a pair of flowering shrubs. They were covered in thick white blooms, but he didn't recognize them, and she didn't think their name.

It was almost evening when she finally climbed the stairs. She went into the room with the oak desk. What was she waiting for? After a moment she came across the hall. He'd left the door open, and he was sitting on the floor, his chin on his knee. She stood in his doorway looking vaguely confused; then she shrugged and walked to him. There were smudges of dirt on her shins and her dress. Her fingernails were black with it. He'd imagined her towering over him, but she didn't. How had he not realized how short she was? It was like a curtain was pulled back and he could see the old man behind the great and powerful Oz.

"How old were you, Edward?"

"What?"

"How old, when you ran your car off the road?"

"Nineteen."

"Nineteen," she repeated. Her voice was soft. "You're not a child, so I'm not going to treat you like one, no matter how you choose to act." She dropped down so her face was in front of him. "But if you ever lay a hand on me again you will wish Carlisle had let you die. You understand?"

"Yes."

"Alright then."

She went into her room and closed the door. He realized he hadn't been breathing, and when he drew in a shaky breath it was rich with the scent of the earth and of her. He heard her pull the sundress over her head and reach into the closet for a robe. She crossed the hall to the bathroom, and Edward pressed his forehead to his knee when he realized what she was doing. Not again, not this soon.

She dropped the robe at her feet and turned on the shower.

 


	3. Checkmate

Isabella pulled on stonewashed jeans and a blue, button up man's shirt, and Edward could imagine her walking around in just the shirt, with her long legs... No, that wasn't right; he kept thinking of her as taller than she actually was. Still, the image of her bare legs beneath a shirt that could have been his was worth envisioning. She rolled the long sleeves up to her forearms; then she was a flash of blue passing outside the door of his empty room and heading down the stairs.

He had been in the same position since she'd warned him never to touch her. Although she hadn't hurt him, there'd been a thick tension in the air, like the atoms between them were accelerating, starting a process from which her violence threatened to ignite. But the moment she'd turned and left, the feeling had evaporated. He wasn't sure why he was still huddled on the floor. Maybe because he didn't know what to do if he went downstairs, or maybe because he did know what she would do; either Isabella would glare and ignore him or she would sit him down to discuss all the ways he had already embarrassed himself.

Although he could stay up here listening to the rain indefinitely, he didn't want to. The sooner he put up with her disapproval, the sooner he could forget it. He walked downstairs and felt the taut pull of apprehension in his shoulders that was almost like paralysis. The house was empty; he'd lost track of her while he was caught up in his own mind. Before he could reach out to find her thoughts, she opened the door. Her bare feet were muddy, and he bit the inside of his lip. Certain destruction or not, he didn't think he could be responsible for himself if she took a third damn shower today.

"Could you hand me a rag?" she asked. "I keep them under the sink."

She gestured to the far corner of the room where there was a counter, a few cabinets, and the empty spaces where a refrigerator and dish washer might have gone. The cabinet beneath the sink was full of cleaning products and a stack of work rags – just recycled shirts and oil stained muslin. He grabbed a flannel scrap off the top of the pile and brought it to her.

"Thanks, I would have tracked up the floor again."

He nodded. Her mind was filled with nothing more than getting mud out from between her toes, so he waited for her to finish.

"Excuse me." She touched his arm as she moved past him into the house, and he stayed still, convincing himself that she wouldn't punish him for contact she initiated.

Mud was silky between her fingers before thinning under water into nothing as she rinsed the rag and laid it across the tap. She dried her hands on her jeans and turned to face him. She knew he was frustrated with the bare cottage, but she imagined he'd feel the same even with a city full of distractions. Still, she thought some activity would be a relief. Edward barely had time to register the novelty of her articulated thoughts before she disappeared up the stairs. He watched through her eyes as she opened a drawer in her pine desk and rummaged past an adze and some chisels that were bound together by string.

When she returned, she went into the empty space where she'd sat earlier, and she dumped the contents of a cloth bag onto the floor. He'd expected something interesting, but all she had was a piece of chalk and a pile of rocks.

"Carlisle said you like to play chess."

"I do."

"Would you like to play now?" she asked.

He glanced at the pile on the floor and back to her.

"Sure."

Sitting down across from her, he watched as she sketched a straight grid of 64 squares, pausing to color in every other one so that it stood out lighter against the dark floorboards. Then she sorted the stones into two piles.

"Light or dark?" she asked.

He kept his fingers curled into his palm, careful to keep from brushing her hand, and pulled the pile of dark stones toward himself. He'd let her have the first move. It wouldn't do her much good.

She leaned over, pointing to each stone in turn to explain that the flat ones were rooks, the pointed were bishops, the chunk of mica was the queen... He set his pieces up and realized he was missing one.

"Sorry." She pulled a red rubber band from her hair, and it fell around her shoulders. "Here's your king."

This had to be the strangest game of chess he'd ever played, and they had yet to start. She moved her pieces into place, laying her last white pebble of a pawn at king 4. He brought his own pawn forward to meet it, and she countered with knight to king's bishop 3. He held in a laugh. She was using the Scotch Game, one of the oldest chess openings. _How long has it been since you played, Grandma?_ After about eight moves, he would have her scrambling to defend herself.

"Do you miss Forks?" she asked.

He let her believe he was giving his answer some thought, but his mind was running through all the permutations of his next move and her possible responses. He slid his knight to king's bishop 3.

"I miss my cd collection," he said. Her face was a blank, and he suspected she had no idea what a cd was. "And I miss my room."

An image of the largest room above them, the one with the oak desk, entered her mind, and she wondered why he hadn't chosen to use it.

"I didn't know it was for me," he said.

Isabella looked up from the board and caught his eye. _Carlisle told me, but it's still interesting to experience your gift first hand._

Despite the fact that there was no one around to hear them, there was something intimate about her speaking to him directly from her mind. He waited, expecting her to feel exposed, even looking forward to her realization that there was no way to hide from him, but she had turned her attention back to the board.

"What's your talent?" He doubted she'd tell him willingly. His hope was that she'd think of it before she could censor herself, but all he got was the image of cinders lighting up the night, flying off a camp fire in the middle of a clutch of thatched huts. "What's with the shacks?" he asked.

"It's your turn."

Instead of her knight, she'd gone off the Scotch Game script and advanced her bishop. He'd been distracted, so he took the opportunity to study her mind, expecting her to focus on something tactile like the feel of her knees on the floorboards, but she was following each series of moves that he could reasonably make to its logical conclusion. He could go with the Two Knights Defense, accept her Scotch Gambit, or transpose into the Giuoco Piano opening. She spent an inordinate amount of time exploring that last option, probably because it was the oldest.

He moved his bishop into position.

"When's the last time you played?" he asked.

She looked up and smiled.

"Not long ago, so don't look smug."

Pawn to queen's bishop 6.

He castled.

"And by not long, you mean…"

"Are you trying to distract me?" She nudged his knee with her hand.

As if he would need to. He already knew what her next move was going to be. She just hadn't picked up the stone that was her bishop yet.

"Only curious."

She thought over her answer, and he got an image of a city street. Black carriages, men in long black coats with a double row of brass buttons, women in bright hourglass dresses with bows and ruffles at their hips so that they looked like walking perfume bottles.

"1885," she said.

"Was that Paris?"

"Prague."

"And you think 1885 is recent?"

"Very." She tried to turn her attention back to the board, but he didn't let up.

"Carlisle said you're older than the Volturi."

"Are you asking a lady her age, Edward?"

"It's not as though you have wrinkles and a walker." He cocked his head to the side. "How old were you when you were turned anyway?"

"Let's stick to one question at a time."

There was something underneath her most obvious thoughts, some buried chant that said, _no, no, no_. She didn't like to be reminded of her human life or the change. That knowledge might come in handy later if he wanted to turn her mind from something else.

"Then what's the answer to my one question."

She moved her bishop.

"Yes."

"Yes, you're older than the Volturi?"

"By about a thousand years."

Given the ages of the vampires who'd become the ruling Volturi, that placed Isabella at somewhere around 2300 BC. He tried to remember his high school history, but the human memories were hazy, and anyway, there were differences in development depending on where exactly she'd lived. The Middle Kingdom in Egypt was quite advanced during the Bronze Age, but Isabella looked European. He couldn't imagine England or Scotland four thousand years ago without his mind going blank.

He moved his pawn.

"So you're like an old cave woman. With furs and a club."

"I said a thousand, not ten thousand." She laughed and slapped her knight down to take his pawn.

"Can I call you Grandma?" His rook slid forward up the board.

"Do it and die."

He knew she was joking. There was no tension in the air at all, and he realized that this was the first time he hadn't been physically uncomfortable in her presence.

"Check," she said.

The board seemed to jump up at him. How had she managed to maneuver her queen into position? There was a weak spot in the line of defense that led to his king. She'd cornered him with her laugh and distractions, and it was all to beat him at the game he never lost. To show him up. His hand flicked forward, and he barely got control of it as he was about to backhand the stones across the room.

Isabella was watching him, but her thoughts were only on the sensation of her breath passing in and out as she waited to see what he would do.

His hand still hung in the air just above the board. It started to shake. He pressed it into a fist and pushed it against his thigh until the need to shove at something started to pass. He closed his eyes and took a few breaths. Nothing he'd done had actually been wrong yet, and the air between them wasn't charged, but he wondered what she would do if she was angry.

"It happens so fast that it feels like my body goes ahead without me," he said.

"They're just rocks, Edward. I wouldn't have been upset."

He opened his eyes and she shrugged.

"Would you like to finish the game?" she asked.

They both looked down at the board, but the back of his neck prickled, and he found it hard to focus. He was going to lose. Tuning in to her thoughts, he watched her visualize his every defense. He would move his pawn to shield his pathetic rubber band of a king. She'd move either her knight or her pawn; that much was obvious. He might counter with his own knight or his rook, but it wouldn't work. And then she saw it. Everything on the board grew dark except for his bishop, sliding back to pin her queen. From there, a clear path led to the loss of her queen and the match, and each move she could see herself making only delayed the inevitable conclusion. She'd shown him how to win.

Isabella looked up at him and smiled.

"We can do the dance," she said, "or I can just resign."

Her smile appeared at the strangest times, but he liked the surprise of it. He felt his fist unclench on his lap, and he flexed his fingers. Yellowed morning light was starting to flood the room, and he began to move her pieces back into their original positions, hoping that she would be willing to take him on again.


	4. Contact

Isabella was lifeless as a paperweight and perched on the roof. Every time he came out and found her still sitting there, Edward had the urge to chuck a stone at her, but apparently fear was a better deterrent than Carlisle's disapproval. In this first week, Edward had learned to wait out her silence by slaking his thirst with a hunt or pounding out a tune on the somewhat battered piano, and this morning he was poring over sheet music he'd discovered in the bench.

Sometime between his childhood lessons and now, musical notation had become a foreign language again. Though he was grateful that the edge had rubbed off the worst of his human memories, everything he'd learned before the change seemed to be swirling down the drain. He wanted to complain, but in truth it was only taking him an hour to relearn a skill that had cost him weeks of lessons the first time around, and anyway it passed the time until Isabella returned to the living, or – to be entirely accurate – the undead.

"I hardly recognize you when you play," she said.

He spun around on the bench to find her standing behind him.

"You're back."

"I never left." She smiled at him, and he felt it in his knees. "I need to run an errand today, and I thought you might like to come along so you can talk to Carlisle."

Edward hadn't bothered to bring his cell phone with him. There couldn't be any reception out here.

"You look confused," she said.

"Maybe."

She turned and left. He'd gotten used to her lack of explanation, and he knew that if he could stay calm and hold his tongue, she'd give him the answers he wanted faster than he'd get them by taking a door off its hinges. He waited while she was out back tipping fuel into a generator. After a few pulls at a starter, the engine rumbled to life. When she returned, she headed for a kitchen drawer, pulled out a cell phone the size of a brick, and plugged it in.

"That your iPhone?" he asked.

"My what?"

He turned away when he couldn't hide a smirk. Every modern reference besides WD-40 and the Swiss Army knife had gone over her head. He wondered how long it had been since she'd ventured out of these woods.

"How do you get things like floor polish, soap, gasoline?" he asked.

"Bat comes out a few times a year."

"Bat?"

"Bartholomew, but he goes by Bat."

"Is that supposed to be a joke?"

"It was a common enough nickname."

"So this guy brings you whatever you need." Edward thought maybe he would take a door off its hinges after all.

"I've known him a long time."

Edward didn't even want to speculate on what 'a long time' was to Isabella.

"Does he owe you or something?" he asked.

She shrugged, so he reached for the answer in her mind, but he only saw himself, looking at her as she looked at him. She stepped around him and went out front to sweep the leaves and needles off the porch. She did this daily, though on a windy day it seemed about as useful as sweeping back the tide.

Eventually the red light turned to green on her clunker of a phone, which was a blessing, since he'd had more than enough of her mind – the repetitive motion of the broom and the pauses when she'd stoop to move a beetle to safety. She put the phone in a canvas bag that she slung over her shoulder, and they were off running. He had to hold back, because he didn't know where they were headed. The farther they went, the thicker the trees became, until it was easier to push off from the trunks than to run on the ground.

She skidded to a stop without warning, and Edward almost plowed into her. He was pretty sure that knocking her down would qualify as the forbidden act of 'laying a hand on her', so he'd swerved to her right, and the ground dropped away. He clawed into the dirt, but it crumbled beneath his hands, and he slid further down a cliff amid a shower of rocks and clay, until finally he caught a thick root sticking out in a gnarled loop, and he swung back and forth in the air.

"Jesus Christ," he said.

Isabella hunkered down so that she was sitting on her heels as she peered over the edge.

"There's a straight drop," she said.

"No kidding."

"Do you need a hand?"

"No." Now that he had his bearings it was a simple matter to climb back up and flip himself onto his feet. He shot her a glare.

"I'm sorry, I didn't see how close you were," she said.

"That's great. You notice every little thing, but you can't pay attention enough to remember that I'm right behind you?"

"I was paying attention. Just not to you."

"Perfect."

"I was minding the trees."

"Ok," Honestly, he gave up. She took more notice of a beetle than she did of him.

"Edward," she said. She walked over to him, and he held his breath. "You're fine. A fall like that couldn't hurt you." She placed a hand on his forearm. The long sleeve of his t-shirt was pushed up to his elbow, so her palm moved back and forth against his bare skin in what was probably just a comforting gesture, but for a moment he knew what it was to immerse himself as she often did in every small sensation. He felt the softness and the pressure of each finger. He felt her thumb press a circle that grazed the underside of his wrist.

"Ok," he said.

She stepped back, and before he could listen in on her thoughts she'd turned her attention to the view. Far below them in the distance, the woods gave way to farmland, and she pointed to the opposite hill that framed the valley. There was a cell tower perched in a bald strip where the tree line had been cleared.

"From here we can make a call without going into town," she said.

Carlisle picked up on the third ring, and Edward listened to both sides of the conversation as they exchanged greetings. It was his first real chance to read her mind while she talked to someone else. The night he arrived, he'd been overwhelmed and out the door, but today he listened as her words came to her and her voice followed right behind like an echo. Only once did she think something other than what she said.

"And how has Edward been?" Carlisle asked. His voiced sounded tinny through the receiver, but there was no mistaking the anxiety behind his question.

For the briefest flash, Edward saw himself in her mind, saw his black eyes and his arm shaking as he reached straight out to pin her to the wall.

"He's been fine of course," she said.

He hadn't known that she had it in her to tell a lie.

Carlisle pressed with a few more questions, all asked in different ways, but circling back to the same concerns. Was Edward staying near the cabin? Was Edward trying her patience? Was Edward the worst thing that ever happened to her? Alright, Carlisle hadn't asked that last question, but honestly Edward didn't need to be able to read minds through the phone to know what Carlisle was thinking.

"Why don't I let you talk to him," Isabella said.

"Hello." Edward's voice sounded oddly formal to his own ears.

"Edward, how have you been?"

"Fine." There was a pause, and he knew he should fill it, but he couldn't think of what to say.

Isabella wandered into the trees and out of sight, probably to give him a sense of privacy, though of course she would still be able to hear him.

"I understand you're behaving."

Edward came about as close as possible to saying, "Right. I'm a good dog. I've been paper trained," but he knew if he did, Carlisle would assume he was being mouthy to Isabella, and that would lead to a longer phone conversation than her aged battery could probably take.

"Things have been alright," he said.

"Good, good."

Again the silence crackled through their patchy connection, but it wasn't as if Edward had so many adventures to relate.

"Esme is completely fine now," Carlisle said.

Of course. That's what Edward was supposed to have asked about in the gap. "That's good." And then because that didn't seem to be enough, he said. "That's really good."

"Well, I'm glad everything has gone smoothly out there."

"Listen, Isabella just came back, and I think she wants to say goodbye."

She was still out of sight, but she must have heard him, because she came around a tree and raised her eyebrows at him as he handed her the phone.

"Don't worry, Carlisle. We're fine," she said.

After she hung up, they stood looking at one another for a long moment.

"I need to call Bat," she said.

He wondered if he was supposed to give her some privacy, but she didn't ask him to go. The phone rang and rang long after anyone's voice mail would have picked up, but eventually there was an answer.

"I hope I didn't drag you back from a hunt," Isabella said.

"Not at all. I was just out on the deck," the man on the other end told her. His voice was strange – musical, but raspy just the same. It reminded him of the stuttering wheeze of a car that was straining to make it up a hill.

"Well I won't keep you. I just wanted to add something to the list if I could. We need more sheet music." Isabella put her hand over the phone and turned to Edward. "What do you want?"

He tried to retrieve composers from the murky depths of human recollection. "Mahler? Brahms. Maybe Beethoven. Definitely Mahler."

She passed along the names. "And whatever else looks good to you," she said.

"Will do."

"Thanks, Bat. I appreciate it."

She put the phone in her bag and turned toward home. They started walking back, still far faster than a human pace, but slow enough that she had time to notice the sensations of her feet against the forest floor. Edward left her to her odd habit until his curiosity drove him to speak.

"Why did you lie?" he asked. "You told Carlisle that I'd been fine."

She smiled. If he stayed here one hundred years he would never understand her bizarre sense of timing.

"You _have_ been fine," she said.

He let out a snort, and then he read her mind and saw that she meant it.

"I screwed up and grabbed you by the neck. I saw you remember it."

"Nothing happened."

"I could have ripped your head off."

"No you couldn't."

He caught a glimpse in her mind of the moment he lay huddled at her feet before he fled the room.

"Stop it," he said.

"It's just a memory. If you're going to poke around in my head, you're going to see whatever comes to mind. You do realize that we can't always control what we think, don't you? It's only what you do – your actions, your words. Those are yours."

He wasn't sure if she was defending her thoughts or giving him a not so subtle reminder not to leap at her again, but either way this conversation was taking a turn he didn't like.

"So you weren't just covering for me with Carlisle?"

"There's a reason newborns get dragged to the middle of the wilderness for a decade or so. It'll work itself out."

He didn't even want to contemplate a decade of feeling the way he had the last two years, so he set that aside and continued walking.

"Thanks for asking about the music," he said.

"It's not a problem." She stepped closer and nudged into him for a moment.

He decided to start counting these small physical connections, because it seemed to him that they were happening more often.

"Would you like to race back?" he asked.

"You think Carlisle didn't warn me about you?"

It was Edward's turn to smile.

He saw her decision to take off before she sprinted away, and it only took three seconds to pass her. He let go and the branches were a windy blur brushing against him as he zigged through the trees. When he reached the cabin, he stopped and waited for her on the porch.


	5. Calm

For his twelfth birthday, Edward asked for a t-square and a drawing compass. He'd wanted to design domed halls that could fit three orchestras and granite banks with secret passageways to impenetrable vaults. As he grew older, the well-behaved lines on the drafting board allowed him a sense of control, while stone and steel offered a sort of permanence. It was the one idea that his mother had supported, so Edward had followed it through to Cornell, and it might have been his life if the accident hadn't put an end to it.

So why was he looking at _Light, Wind and Structure, Good City Form,_ and _The Genius of the Place_? Almost half of the texts on the floor beside the oak desk were old architecture books.

He leapt over the stairs to land with a thud on the ground floor of the cabin.

"What is this supposed to mean?" The pages flapped as he waved them in her face.

She'd been washing up at the sink, and when she turned, she surprised the hell out of him by poking him in the chest.

"You. Calm. Down," she said.

He took a step backward and heard the thwack as the textbook hit the floor.

"Now," she said. "Tell me what the problem is."

It took a moment to find his voice. She walked past him to get a hand towel, but he had the sense that she would wait for him all day.

"I don't understand why these are here." He picked up the book. "Did Carlisle tell you my life history or something?"

"Just a few things. That you liked architecture and music."

"And he told you about the accident."

"He did."

"And my talent." Was there anything Carlisle hadn't told her? "You think you have me figured out, and I don't know shit about you."

"Edward, if there's one thing I've learned, it's that I don't have much of anything figured out." She threaded the towel through the handle of a drawer. "Why are you upset? Is it really because I was told a few things about the person coming to live with me? I thought you'd like the piano and the books. If you don't, then ignore them."

It had not occurred to him that the piano was new here. He could see it now. Bat had brought it just days before he arrived. She thought his name. He had short cropped white hair, and he was tall and sinewy, all lean muscle and bony elbows. Isabella blinked; the image disappeared, and he saw himself in her mind.

"So I live here now?" he asked.

"Don't you?"

"I feel like a visitor."

"This is where you are." She shrugged. "How you feel about it is up to you."

"Nothing's up to me. Carlisle just decided for everyone."

"You chose to come here when you sent Esme through a window."

"I didn't know she'd get hurt. She'd have been fine if she hadn't wanted that stupid patio…" He'd heard her land in the yard, and wouldn't even have bothered to look if she hadn't moaned a low howl from below. Rebar spikes marked the area where the concrete was going to be poured, and two of the ridged barbs had torn through her – one in the chest and one in the thigh. Carlisle had had to lift her up and off of them. "She healed. It couldn't have killed her. And she was always in my face, wanting to talk, wanting attention."

"I would think you of all people would understand that."

Isabella was making it seem like he and Esme were the same, and he wasn't going to take that crap. He threw the book on the counter and took a step closer to her.

_Stop._

Her thought surprised him. He was only going to yell at her, but almost immediately he could start to feel the now familiar tension in the air, and no amount of willing himself not to be afraid was going to work. He stepped back.

_Breathe._

He didn't see the point, but he listened. In. Out. He took another deep breath. The terrible feeling in his gut started to fade a little, so he moved back again.

"Sit on the porch, and I'll come out," she said.

He backed up until he felt the door behind him, and he reached for the handle. The dark forest was unnervingly quiet. There were no birds, no squirrels out here. He sat on the steps and wondered if she thought he needed to calm down further or if she needed time for herself. He knew he didn't frighten her; that much was painfully obvious.

She brought the broom out with her, and neither of them said anything while she swept the floorboards. She was wearing another sundress, and if he could've put aside the way she made him cower, she could almost have been soft and slight. Her hair was down, and it fell over her shoulder. The pendant she always wore looked too heavy as it swung forward with each sweep of her arms and then fell back against her throat. She leaned the broom by the door and smoothed the dress down behind her as she sat next to him. Her knee pressed against his.

"What would you like to know about me?" she asked.

Her attention was focused on the feeling of her hands clasped together, but there was still an undercurrent of the danger he'd felt inside.

"How did you get that pendant?" he asked. It was a stupid question. He could think of a hundred things he would rather know, but he'd been staring at it, and the words had just come out.

She brought her hand up to her chest, and in her mind he saw dark red smeared across bronze. The scent of human blood was rich and sweet, and he wanted her memory to stop.

"Ask me something else," she said.

He couldn't focus for a moment. The blood was fading from her mind, but he knew he would need to hunt again soon.

"I don't know. Uh, have you ever lived in a city?"

"Several cities."

"Prague?" It was the only place she'd mentioned.

"I was only visiting."

"Name one that was your home," he said.

"Ur was my first. Before then, I didn't even know there were that many people in the world, or that so many could live on the banks of one river together. I was a few hundred years old, but I was still surprised at the pull of that much blood. The Sumerians had open air markets and great stone temples like square layer cakes, with each layer smaller than the one below. I had not yet seen the pyramids in Egypt, but I was already amazed at what people could do."

Reading her mind was like seeing a film. He watched men in bright woolen tunics with tassels and broad belts; they moved past Isabella in the night, unaware that she would be just the same when all of them were long dead.

Her eyes were shining with an excitement he'd not seen before. What had she been like long ago? Even now, just from the memory, she had the glow of a girl eager to take in the world. Her shoulders were white beneath the black straps of her cotton dress, and he wished that he was allowed to touch her. He'd been in a rage the only time he'd felt that neck, and then the fear had overtaken him, and he'd never even noticed what her skin was like beneath his hand.

She turned to him and smiled, and her knee pressed further against him. He noticed how much smaller it was than his. Deceptively delicate. She felt her feet against the ground, and she thought it helped her stay calm. He wanted to ask her what that meant, but to do so he would have to break the moment. Her attention turned to the sensation of their skin pressed together, and he felt her shift towards him a little more. He brought his hand down to his knee, and his fingers brushed against her. She was breathing, but he sure as hell wasn't going to. He realized again how quiet the woods were. She thought his touch was unintentional, which might've explained why he was still in one piece. Her attention turned to the sensation of his fingers, barely discernable through the cotton of her dress. _A feather_ , she thought. He caught a hazy image, like a sketch, of her outstretched hands cradling a baby bird. It was just a flash, but he could see that her wrists were pink with life, blood moving beneath the thin surface of her skin.

It had to be thousands of years ago, and he turned to her in surprise.

"I should hunt," she said. "Now's a good time." She stood and brushed the dust off her dress.

He had no idea why the time was right, but he was always thirsty. "Let's go," he said. He wondered what she'd look like going in for the kill.

"I hunt alone."

In an instant, he felt the usual tightening in the back of his neck, and his foot pressed the step below him until the wood started to give way under the strain. If she noticed she didn't let on. There was nothing in her mind but the breeze and the moonlight on the trees.

"Why?" he asked.

"You've had enough answers tonight." She sounded distant, untouchable, and she didn't look at him.

"Right. Whatever."

She set off at a run, and he lost sight of her almost immediately, but he could read her mind for miles. She was feeling her damn feet hit the ground, and it gave him pretty much nothing to go on. What the hell was the matter with her?

He thought about going into the house and making do with music or reading or snooping around her room, but she was moving faster and farther away. Soon she was going to be too far even to read. He hadn't thought she would leave him so completely.

When he started to run, he told himself it was just so he could stay connected with her mind. He followed the trail of her thoughts through the trees for twenty miles until he caught up and had to stop for fear she'd catch his scent. There were coyotes nearby, and he could see her in the distance crouching low. Her thoughts had turned into a mantra of _Calm, Be sweet, Bella, calm…_ and he found it eerily soothing. What was she doing? The coyotes were restless. They began howling, low and plaintive, and Isabella had gone completely still. _Calm, settle, settle…_ Usually the hunt was guaranteed to invoke their primal nature, but with each passing moment she looked more like a girl hiding in the undergrowth. He had the sense that he could've picked her up and carried her off. Her thoughts were so weirdly docile and trancelike that he started to step towards her, but then she leapt on her prey, and he heard the yelp and the sounds of the other coyotes moving back.

 _Thank you for your life_ , she thought, and the moment was so intimate that he felt like the intruder he was. He pressed himself to the bark of a tree and hoped to God he could get back to the cabin without her knowing that he'd been here.


	6. Blood

Edward knew where Isabella was without scent or sound, because he read her thoughts as she leaned over the coyote she'd drained. She had one hand in the fur, and she waited for the initial rush of the blood to subside. It had been over a month since her last hunt, and he wondered if that was normal for her. He was desperate for blood almost daily, but Carlisle had been fine going a week or two between kills.

The breeze shifted. She raised her head and stared into the darkness. There were deer in the distance.

 _Be calm, Bella_ , she told herself. _Sweet and calm._

If she discovered him, he could bet she would be anything but sweet or calm, so he waited until she left to stalk the herd before he moved. The cabin was to the east, but the wind was mostly from that direction, so he decided to circle south first to help mask his scent.

The moon made the landscape sharp and colorless. The trees had more room to breathe, and the undergrowth was thin. Edward had not been this far from the cabin since he arrived, and every once in a while he would come across a narrow, worn track in the ground. He stopped at a towering pine with a blue rectangle painted on the trunk and put his nose to the mark. Paint, sap, waterlogged bark and something more. There was a hint of ash and fire in the air and, _dear God_ , the barest whiff of something that wrenched every muscle tight like a harp string. Blood. So sweet it rivaled Isabella's memory from before. Blood like a tribal beat.

There was a roar echoing off the trees. Edward was running almost on all fours without having made the decision to run. The source was still miles away but the scent grew more complex. The petroleum smell of vinyl, an appalling stench of cooked meat, and behind it the call of urgent, potent blood.

There was a cut, and there was antiseptic and clotting, and the small wound far ahead was the center of the world. The roar sounded again, and he felt it in his throat. The beat of the blood up ahead pounded faster. He made his feet match the pulse – twenty sprints to a heartbeat. Nothing but the blood now. It seemed like there would never be anything again but this blood, until he heard branches cracking behind him. He counted the slower footfalls of his pursuer and knew that no one could catch him in time to steal his kill.

"Edward, wait!" he heard, but the sound meant nothing to him.

He pushed himself until his muscles were at the edge of what they could do, but then a sudden fear hit him so hard it made him stumble. He rolled back onto his feet and hurtled forward. For a moment, he thought it was only panic that he would lose the kill, but that made no sense, because the prey was his to take.

The fear kept swelling in his chest.

"Edward!"

 _Hang on_ , he told himself. _Just ahead_. But the terror chasing from behind shook him so hard that his feet gave out, and he rolled, limbs out of control, into a curled up ball on the dirt. His end was coming. He could feel it bearing down on him as she got closer. As much as he longed to meet death with his teeth sunk into the throat of the prey up ahead, the terror made it hard to get his limbs to work. For a moment he had a random memory of himself as a child clinging to a frayed, green blanket. He was twitching on the ground with the effort to move, until finally dread pulled him under.

"Edward."

He heard a mind practically shouting, _Be calm. Stop._

"Edward, please. It's ok."

He felt his knee being tugged away from his chin, and as the pressure on his jaw lessened, his teeth started to chatter. Surely the force of it was going to crush his incisors.

"No," he heard himself say, but it came out more of a moan than a word.

Isabella was trying to pry his hands from his face. "I'm sorry. You're going to be ok," she said, but she was pleading. "Look at me."

The air was thick with the tension that could only come from Isabella, and Edward felt the ground beneath him, felt her climbing over him. She managed to push his fingers back, and her hair brushed against his cheek as she leaned close.

"Don't breathe," she said.

He didn't.

"There's a pair of humans further south. You caught their scent."

He remembered the blood now. There was a part of him at the primal base of his skull that wanted to return to the hunt even now, but fear of what Isabella could do had rendered him almost catatonic in its wake. He fought against it, wanting to run, even if only to get away from danger. The woman above him had almost destroyed him; he was sure she'd come close to unleashing her own brand of hell, but her words were soft.

"You're fine," she said.

He shook his head. It was possible he would never be fine again knowing that a dread this dark and bottomless existed. There was a keening sound, and he realized he was using the last of the air in his lungs.

"Easy. Relax." She leaned in closer and brought her lips to his cheek so she could press the words against his skin. "Easy." Her pendant hit his chin and her elbows were on either side of his head; her long hair was a curtain parting them from the rest of the forest, and he couldn't understand why he didn't feel trapped beneath her. Her mouth moved across his eyelids and to the other cheek, catching against his skin as her lips pursed together in words of comfort he could no longer make out. He felt the tip of her tongue on the thin skin behind his ear, and her voice was warm and breathy there. "'S fine."

Edward felt safer pressed between her and the earth. With his eyes closed, he could still envision the trail her mouth was making as she kept to the line of his jaw. Then her mouth moved against his. At first he just lay motionless and memorized the feeling. The pressure of her lips and the teeth behind them. Her warmth. Then he flickered alive and kissed her back as his hands moved to her shoulders and clutched her tight to his chest. She felt small against him, and he brought one hand around to brush fingertips against the smooth skin at her neck. His touch was light, as though his softness now could make up for the way he'd tried to bully her last week. Close like this, she was mesmerizing, and he wanted it to last. She tilted her head to the side and her lips pressed harder. Her tongue touched his lower lip, and he bucked up against her and took in a shuddering breath.

The air was thick with the scent of human blood. His need for it crashed back over him. He shoved upwards again, this time to throw her off, but he only succeeded in rolling them sideways. She dug her fingers into his arms. It wouldn't be enough. One more thrust and he would be away.

"Stop breathing."

"I can't," he said. He didn't want to.

The fear started to creep back in and he longed to throw her against a tree, but there was no stopping what she could do. He could feel it right down to the marrow. Why hadn't Carlisle warned him that she was like this?

"Come on." She pulled him to his feet, and he shuffled forward, though they were headed away from the blood. "Run with me. You don't want to know what it feels like to end human lives."

Actually he did. At this moment, the only thing holding him back was the threat of whatever the hell it was she could do to him if she put her mind to it. He'd stopped breathing, though – anything to avoid a repeat of thrashing in the dirt – and he let her drag him the twenty miles back to the cabin while the scent of blood faded until the forest covered it over with earth and pine. He pressed his face into Isabella's neck so that verbena would overpower everything else.

When she let him drop to the porch steps he was panting.

A normal night in this boring wilderness could send him over the edge, so this one had been more than enough to turn him into mush. Bloodlust and fear followed by Isabella's body flush against him. Everything but the bloodlust was wrapped up in her, and it occurred to him again that he was screwed. She could have him dancing like a puppet if she wanted.

But she'd been sweet as well. Even Carlisle with his somber eyes and patient smile had not been able to make him feel as safe as Isabella had when she'd whispered in his ear. Nothing he felt made sense, and he didn't even have the energy to work the tension out by tearing into her.

"Are you alright?" she asked

"I don't even know what the fuck to say to that."

She raised an eyebrow at him. Carlisle had warned him not to curse. Edward had assumed it was just for the sake of politeness, but maybe she really didn't like it.

"Sorry," he mumbled, surprising them both.

She sat down next to him, and he wanted to take her hand. Next he would start picking wildflowers and threading them into chains. Why did she sit so close? It was like she was daring him to touch her when she'd told him that he could not. She certainly had no problem touching him though.

"Why did you do that?" he asked.

She jumped up and started to pace in front of him. "You were going to kill them."

"Not that." He rolled his eyes. "Why did you kiss me?"

She stopped and crossed her arms. It made the black strap of her dress fall down, but she shoved it back up. "I wanted to comfort you. You were a mess."

"What the hell is it that you can do?" he whispered. "I can feel something coming, something so close. It's like, if you let it go further, the air is going to erupt and knock us back into oblivion. Is it lightening? It feels electric. I can't even…" he trailed off to a stop when he realized he needed to give her room if he wanted the answer.

"I can't tell you."

"Can't or won't?"

"I'm sorry. It's not… It isn't something I'm willing to talk about."

"Does Carlisle know?"

"No."

"Bat?"

"No one." She sighed and dropped her arms to her side. "No one but the one who turned me, if he's even still alive."

He could feel her moving the conversation away from herself, but curiosity made him take the bait. "Why wouldn't he be alive?"

"He dropped out a long time ago, disappeared. The last I saw him was in Herculaneum, and he may have ended it in the fires."

What he saw in her mind wasn't fire, but ash and smoke. "You've lost me, Bella," he said.

She went completely still.

"What did you just say?"

"You've lost me."

"You called me Bella."

He nodded.

"There's only one time I've called myself that." She stalked toward him. "You had no right to follow me on a hunt." Her hands were pulled into fists. Her mind was a stuttering streak of _Calm. Calm._

"So now hunting is a secret too?"

"I asked you not to," she said. She shook her head and turned to run. "Stay here. No following me this time."

When she'd gone so far that even her thoughts had left him, Edward sat on the steps and waited to feel some sense of control. It was a long wait. The sun came up, and small circles of light made it past the canopy. At least he didn't have death on his hands this morning, and he had her to thank for that. She was still far enough out that her mind was hidden from him, but it was the first time since he'd come here that she'd had that sort of privacy, so he tried not to let it bother him. He stood and opened the door to the empty house. Upstairs he pulled off his dirty clothes and took a bath, and when she still hadn't returned, he wandered down the narrow hall and into her room.


	7. Bat

Perhaps it hadn't been the smartest move to wander down the hall into Isabella's room. Edward would be warned of her return as soon as she came close enough to read her mind, but if he rifled through her few possessions, she might notice that they were out of place. The contents of her desk drawers were thrown together haphazardly – woodworking tools alongside pens, paperclips and ponytail holders. There was no way to look beneath what he could see on the surface without taking everything out piece by piece.

He sat, leaning over a drawer, curiosity with its claws in him, but another more circumspect voice was telling him to be careful. He'd already eavesdropped on her hunt, given her no privacy in her mind, and had lasted exactly thirteen days before he'd forced her to chase him down to keep him from ripping out the arteries of a couple of humans. _She really is my babysitter_ , he thought, and the idea tasted bitter. Was that how she saw him? Ever since the change – and hell, he'd admit it, even before – he had always just been someone's responsibility.

But there had been a moment, even while submerged in the inky dread of Isabella's unknown talent, when it felt like she had needed something from him, and he'd responded to her kiss. If he hadn't been practically incapacitated, if he hadn't taken a blood scented breath, he wondered where that moment might have led. She'd claimed it was only comfort, but there were plenty of ways to calm someone down besides pressing your tongue to their lips, demanding access. He longed to replay the memory in his mind, but whenever he tried, all of it came back, the dread and the bloodlust inseparable from the feel of her urgent mouth against his. He groaned aloud. How was he supposed to know her when he didn't understand most of the things she did?

Perhaps her room would offer him some clues. That's what he told himself as he began to lay the contents of her top drawer in neat rows along the floor. He felt like an archaeologist, trying to create a picture from an odd assortment of items. A few things had outlived their usefulness: the busted pocket watch and an old book of 3¢ stamps commemorating an Antarctic expedition. But most were utilitarian: a flathead screwdriver, worn paintbrushes, a bottle of wood glue. If he had to present his findings, he'd say she was handy, had written a few letters many years ago, and probably didn't care what time it was. It wasn't exactly like seeing into the heart of her, so he decided to move on to the window seat. The urn on top stood like an ancient sentry. It was pointed at the bottom and wouldn't have stayed upright on its own. She had it sitting in a simple wooden base that she'd probably carved herself. Very carefully he lifted the cedar block and set the urn down a few feet away where he'd be sure not to bump it.

Just before he lifted the lid of the window seat, there was a moment when he felt like Carter and Carnarvan thrusting a candle into Tut's tomb. Edward hovered with the lid half up, savoring the feeling and the musty scent. Then he gave in to the pressure to explore.

There were books. He noticed that right away. There was a gold scarab bigger than his fist, proving that his feeling of kinship with the modern raiders of Tut's tomb was not far off; the gold alone was too valuable to contemplate. There was a large, jeweled knife that curved up at the end, and there were several boxes to explore. A deep blue sari was folded and wrapped in plastic.

He went for the books first. They were journals, light in color, simply bound, with worn remnants of handwritten script on the spine in a faded brown. He brought the cover to his face and smelled dust and age, but also a hint of verbena that was all Isabella. Though the books couldn't have been more than a few hundred years old, it was strange to catch a latter day scent of her. He opened the first of the journals.

He tilted his head and then the book, but it wasn't written in a language he knew. Interspersed with hand drawn pictographs, he saw a few lines of hieroglyphics and, as he flipped the crumbling pages, a short passage in old English caught his eye. He couldn't read the words, but he ran his finger along the page.

Fërend wyrcan Crïstemæl. L _îfgedäl cuman. Goldbeorht, wanfeax frëo, leona cuman._

He turned randomly and found a page near the end with the same word written several times in a shaky hand.

swëtïan

He stared, but the letters wouldn't give up their secrets. Even when Isabella's thoughts were open to him, even when her journal lay in his hands, she managed to elude him. He had returned the first book and was reaching for another when he froze in place.

There was a song in the trees, getting closer.

 _Are there any more real cowboys left out in these hills_  
Will the fire hit the iron one more time  
And will one more dusty pickup come rolling down the road  
With a load of feed before the sun gets high  
Well I hope that working cowboy never dies

It was a man, and though he was singing a ragged tune, Edward had the memory to place that voice. He'd heard Bat speak to Isabella over the phone. Any hope of returning Isabella's things to the drawer in something like their original place was forgotten as he hurried to get everything out of sight. The urn nearly slipped from his hand when it wobbled in its wooden base. He backed up and reassured himself that the floor was clear before he headed downstairs. Then he wore a path back and forth as the song grew louder and finally stopped.

"You in there Isabella?" Bat called.

Edward read Bat's thoughts as he took a deep breath and realized that she wasn't close. No verbena on the breeze. It bothered Edward that someone else knew her scent like the back of his hand, but he didn't have time to mull it over, because Bat's thoughts turned to him.

"Just the new kid, eh?" he called.

Not wanting to seem like he was hiding in the house, he stepped onto the porch.

"Morning," Bat said. "Brought some things Isabella thought you'd need. Here."

Bat tossed a large olive green sack at Edward, and he leapt off the porch to catch it. It felt like more books and maybe some clothes or something else soft at the top. The drawstring was knotted about six times over.

Though he was casting off light in prisms, Bat looked exactly as Isabella had pictured him. Wiry and lean with white hair. But as he walked up to the porch Edward noticed some details that surprised him. There were fine wrinkles on his face, and deep lines around his mouth and his eyes. It was unlike anything he'd seen among their kind before, though granted he hadn't met but a dozen or so.

"You talk?" Bat asked. He had a bowie knife in a leather case that snapped to his belt. Hanging from his shoulders were three more olive green sacks, and he was holding a large cast iron weathervane.

"Hey," Edward said.

Bat shifted the metal piece to one arm and held out his left hand to shake.

Though Edward would have preferred to keep his distance from the stranger, he could tell from Bat's thoughts that there were no plans to fight, so he took his hand and let Bat give it a hard squeeze.

"Come in," Edward said. It was the closest he could come to sounding welcoming, but it was enough for Bat, who dumped the duffle bags on the downstairs floor and turned around to get a good look at Edward.

"You don't seem like much of a handful to me," Bat said.

Edward felt his breathing stop and his neck tense, but then he realized Bat was testing him, seeing how easily he would lose his temper.

"Hell when I was a newborn, a stranger come up to me, I would've knocked him sideways."

"You're not a stranger," Edward said, and he tapped his temple.

"Ah, right, you're the mind reader. Seen me in Isabella's head?" He laughed and then started to untie one of the bags. "You poor bastard. I bet that's more trouble than it's worth."

"I get along," Edward said. It was easier to keep his voice even when he knew that Bat was prodding him on purpose.

Bat had made quick work of the knots, but instead of opening the bag he stood up. "Well, I'd heard you were coming out here because you were wild, but you seem pretty tame to me. Now don't get upset," he said when he saw the look on Edward's face. "It takes a hell of a man to keep himself tame in the first ten years or so. I thought you'd be growling and snarling from the moment I got here." He laughed again. "I could have used a good scrap; it's been too long, but I don't think Isabella would approve. She likes things nice and quiet doesn't she? Keeps the peace."

It was the most anyone had said to Edward in a while, unless he counted some of Carlisle's longer speeches, and he realized he liked the distraction.

"I think I've given her a hard time," Edward said.

"Of course you have. She's been out here on her own since I built this place. Needs some stirring up before she turns into a goddamned tree."

"You do a lot for her," Edward said, and though it wasn't a question, he could tell Bat took it that way. For a moment the white haired vampire looked him up and down, and Edward had to fight to hold his gaze even as Bat speculated on whether Edward was jealous.

"I'd do anything for her," he said. "She saved my granddaughter when no one else could."

It all made sense then, the white hair, the fine lines. Bat had been a grandfather when he was turned. The perfect health and the strength had made it hard for Edward to figure out. He'd never seen a vampire with an old body before, nor had he thought about what it might be like. Clearly any illness or weakness was gone, so he guessed it hardly mattered.

"How old were you?" he asked.

"When she saved Ginnlaug?"

"No, when you were turned. Wait, _Ginnlaug_?" What kind of name was that?

"We didn't count the years like an obsession back then. I guess about seventy. And yes, Ginnlaug. Ginnie as she goes by now. She's my granddaughter."

Edward saw a flash of her in Bat's mind. She was beautiful and very thin with straight, blonde hair, but she had a tight lipped smile and narrowed eyes that made Edward want to step back.

"She's a pistol. No one can tell her anything. Or at least, I never could."

"And Isabella saved her? Did she turn her?" Edward asked. He wouldn't call that saving, but he knew Carlisle thought he had saved Edward when he'd changed him.

"I don't think Isabella's ever turned anyone. No, she went to New Mexico for me a while back and put the fear into my girl." Bat gave Edward a look to see if he understood, and Edward nodded. He knew all about the fear. "Nothing else would have pried Ginnie out of there. She was hip deep in the battle to take Santa Fe. I couldn't talk her down, and there were rumors the Volturi were coming in to end it. Turned out to be true. If Ginnie hadn't left when she did, she'd have been slaughtered like the rest of them." He shook his head.

In his mind Edward could see an image of Ginnie shouting and throwing furniture, and he hoped he wouldn't be meeting her anytime soon.

"I've never met two of our kind who were family before." Edward said. He thought of his own mother who had been too far gone for Carlisle to turn, but he couldn't see her as a newborn. The image of his mother being emotional and out of control was impossible to imagine.

"I was on my deathbed," Bat said. "I'd parceled out my things and said my goodbyes. I'd already seen everyone I'd grown up with die, either in battle or of old age. I was a relic even then. But Ginnie slipped into my hut. I hadn't seen her for months. Everyone believed she was dead, and I guess she was. I thought she'd come to take me to the warriors' table, but when she bit me it was Muspellheim, the land of fire, instead. She never did like to let go." He looked over at Edward with gold eyes.

"Were you always vegetarian?"

"What?"

"My maker, Carlisle, he calls us vegetarians. Those of us who hunt animals."

"No, I didn't stop draining humans until about a hundred and fifty years ago. It was Isabella."

"She told you to?"

He shook his head. "Not her style. I'd wanted to thank her for what she did in Santa Fe. I got her this land and built this cabin, but she hadn't asked for it. She wanted me to try to live off animals for one year. I thought it was for the sake of humans. I figured her for a sap. It took me all of four seasons to realize how much different I was once I got off the human blood. Less quick to fight, less moody. I was able to settle down in one place. She only asked for a year, but she must have known I would see things differently by then. I've never gone back. I live near Boston now. Set myself up with a custom shop. Which reminds me," he said, pulling the huge weather vane from the floor. "I'm going to put this on the roof. Come up and give me a hand and I'll tell you more about Isabella. Don't think I don't see how your face lights up every time I say her name."

Edward wondered if that was true, and then he saw his own expression mirrored back to him in Bat's mind. If anyone looked like a sap, it was him.

"Don't take all day," Bat said. "I can't imagine she'll leave a newborn like you on his own for much longer. If you have things you want to know, you better get up on that roof. Much as I love Isabella I won't be staying long when she gets back," he said. "She's an angel, but she scares the hell out of me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Lyrics by Willie Nelson.
> 
> Fërend wyrcan Crïstemæl. _Lîfgedäl cuman. Goldbeorht, wanfeax frëo, leona cuman. -_ The messenger makes the sign of the cross. _Death comes. Bright like gold, dark-haired, a lioness comes._


	8. True

Bat dug around in one of the bags he'd brought and pulled out a box of galvanized screws. The weathervane he'd made was ridiculously large. It was cast iron with arrows radiating in the four directions, and the figure at the top was a thin copper scarab beetle, much like the gold one Edward had seen in Isabella's window seat.

"Watch out for the hole in the roof when you jump up, or you'll fall into her room," Edward said. "I don't know why she doesn't fix that."

"Stubborn woman put it there herself. I'd always find her on the porch, so I told her I built a solid house, and she could damn well go inside. The hole was our compromise. She can work at her desk and read in her room without feeling like she's all boxed up." Bat laughed. "She's just used to the outdoors. Grew up that way. Always out in the trees or picking feverfew, mint, spiderwort for her mother."

Edward was holding Bat's iron sculpture in place on the top beam on the cabin. "She never told me that," he said. "Of course, she doesn't tell me much of anything."

"Does that whine get you far with her?" Bat asked. "If she doesn't talk to you, she's probably just trying to stay out of your way. Make it easier on you."

"I'd rather she talk to me."

Bat slapped him on the back and said, "You're either brave or stupid or head over heels."

"I'm not any of those things."

Bat shook his head and pulled a screw out of his pocket and lined it up with the hole in the base of the weathervane. Then he pressed it into the wood and used his thumb and finger to twist it quickly down until it was flush with the beam.

"Did you know her when she was human?" Edward asked.

"Hell no." He pulled another screw out of his shirt pocket. "She's got about 3000 years on me. I just know her mother was some kind of healer and that she was killed when Isabella was fifteen. Isabella was bitten about a year later, and–"

"Wait," Edward said. "Are you telling me that she's sixteen?"

"4316, or somewhere thereabouts."

"But she was sixteen when she was turned? So she's sixteen?" He jumped up and started pacing up and down the roof. "Sixteen," he repeated to himself. He almost fell into the hole.

Bat leaned back against the roof and laughed. "You worried she's too young for you?" he asked, but this made him laugh even harder.

"It would be illegal in some states," Edward grumbled.

"I can see you already have your eyes on the prize, but let me tell you something, lover boy, that woman comes from a time when you were either very savvy or very lucky to live to thirty, and most her age would have had a man and a couple of kids."

"Did she?" Edward asked. "Have a man, I mean?"

"I don't know." He cocked his head to the side. "Are you jealous of someone who may or may not have existed thousands of years ago?"

"No."

"Damn, I wish Ginnie was here. She'd have you sorted in a minute. She knows a lie when she hears it." Bat pulled a cigarette from his pocket and lit up. "I expect that's why she hasn't found a mate."

"Do you have one?" Edward asked.

"They say there's a mate for all of us sometime, but thankfully I haven't met mine. My only hope is that she doesn't go anywhere near Boston while I'm living there."

Edward thought of Carlisle and the way Esme had quickly become the center of his world. "It seems like a sickness to me," he said. "One minute you're fine, and the next all you can think about is one person."

Bat nodded. "I have no desire to be besotted. I did that more than enough times in my human life, and though thankfully the sordid details have faded to nothing, I remember that it was no picnic."

Edward spun the beetle around. It made a high-pitched squeak as it swung north and then south with the breeze when he let it go.

"I'll need to fix that," Bat said. "You got anything in the shed?"

There was oil out back, but Edward had a better idea. He ran upstairs and rummaged through Isabella's desk until he found WD-40. After a quick spray, the top of the weathervane turned silently, and they sat for a moment without speaking while Edward tried to think of what to find out next.

"She told me you don't know her talent," he said.

"Haven't a clue. That's probably a good thing. From what I heard, she used it once as a newborn and wiped out a village. But a Volturi guard told me that, so take it with a bucket full of salt. I've known her about a thousand years, and she's been gentle as a lamb. Still, she gives you that feeling like something bad is going to happen."

"I don't know why Carlisle sent me here, knowing what she can be like."

Bat looked unconvinced.

"Ok," Edward said. "I sent his mate through a window, and it didn't turn out well."

"You're lucky all he did was send you away." He let out a low whistle. "Besides, Isabella's probably the best one keep you in line. A newborn like you needs someone putting the fear into him."

Edward wanted to take a swing, but the older vampire was expecting it, so instead he fought hard to keep his fists at his side.

"She must be teaching you some restraint," Bat said.

There was only so much time left to learn what he wanted to know, so Edward let the remark slide. "How did you meet her?" he asked.

"Dumb luck. For a long time after the change I stayed in Norway. I came across her one night, running in the snow, hunting reindeer. I'd never seen a vampire hunt animals before. I wasn't even sure what she was doing, and when I walked up I scared off the herd. She said it had taken her an hour to get close to them."

"That doesn't make sense," Edward said.

Bat nodded. "I thought she was crazy. Out there chasing animals around, and not doing a very good job of it. I gave her directions to a village where she could have her choice of humans, hoping that she'd leave. Instead, she asked me about Enkidu."

"Who?"

"Keep quiet, and I'll tell you. She asked me about the vampire who had been the one to turn her. She hadn't seen him for several hundred years. I'd never heard of him, but I was a nomad, and I only knew a half dozen others back then, so that was no surprise. I thought she was going to kill me, so I lied and said I knew the guy. I told her he'd gone across to Iceland. When she left, I figured I'd seen the last of her. She didn't find him, of course, and she ended up back on my shores, hoping to question me again."

Edward wanted to hear it all, but he couldn't stop the urge to interrupt. "Was he her mate?" he asked.

Bat opened his mouth to speak and then closed it again. "Aw hell," he said. "I was going to mess with you, but I don't think you could take it." He dropped his cigarette and stubbed it out on the roof. "I don't think she loved him. They had a rocky relationship, but not the kind you're worried about."

Edward let his attention wander farther out, and he caught the crunch underfoot of pine needles in Isabella's mind. "She's on her way," he said.

She was taking her time coming back, but she had to be within ten miles or so for him to read her. He had been dreading this moment, hoping to get more time alone with Bat and his stories, but now he found he didn't mind having her near. Bat, on the other hand, had jumped down and stepped inside to collect the few things he wasn't leaving here: a second pack of cigarettes and his phone.

"You should get her a BlackBerry or an iPhone," Edward said when Bat reappeared on the porch. "That thing she's using barely works."

Bat shook his head. "She won't want it. Too many features."

"I thought you said she could use some shaking up."

"I said it was good that you were doing it. I didn't say I wanted to."

Edward sensed the recognition in Isabella's mind when she caught Bat's scent – smoke and something like cloves. She quickened her pace. When she finally appeared from between the trees, he felt himself relax a little. She might not be the most soothing person in the world, but to be honest, everything seemed to unsettle him, so it might as well be her.

"Bat," she said. She gave him a hug, and to most it would have looked like any greeting between friends, but Edward watched the slow motion train wreck of thoughts as Bat fought to hide how much having her close made him edgy. He wasn't great at pretending, but Edward was sure she was used to that, having known him for so long. She pulled back just as Bat reached up to give a weak pat to her shoulder. Edward tried to remember if Carlisle had been like this, but the moment they'd made it into the house Edward had fled, so he had no idea. He did remember how Carlisle almost bowed when she first stepped onto the porch. Of course, Edward had bowed too, but that was just because the first time she looked at him had been intense, and anyway he'd been upset as hell about being dropped off.

Her thoughts turned to the now familiar chant of _calm, be sweet_ , and he realized that she was trying not to upset Bat, just as she had tried not to startle the coyotes. Whatever she was doing was helping Bat's smile reach his eyes again, but after a little more small talk he was quick to make an exit.

"Ginnie's driving up to see me tomorrow. I should get everything ready."

It wasn't a lie, but Edward knew Bat was grateful to have the excuse.

"Please say hello from me," Isabella said.

"Of course." Bat's thoughts made it clear that Isabella's name was about the last thing his granddaughter wanted to hear, but it served as another reminder that the woman in front of him was the reason he still had any kin to speak of. "If you need anything else," he said, "anything at all, you let me know, and I'll be back." Bat turned to Edward. "Don't burn the place down, kid."

"She keeps a child lock on the drawer with the matches," Edward said, and both Bat and Isabella looked at him. "What? I can have a sense of humor."

"He's a keeper," Bat said.

It wasn't until Bat was gone that Edward remembered that she hadn't seen the weathervane. When he pointed it out she jumped up and spun it around once. She smiled a little and looked out across the trees to where Bat had disappeared. Her expression was almost wistful, and he tried to reconcile the woman he was watching with the sixteen year old girl she had once been.

She took a step and bumped the can of WD-40 which bounced off the porch railing and fell at his feet.

"I'm sorry," Edward said. "I had to go into your room to get that."

"That's alright," she said.

She jumped down, but she was still preoccupied. He wanted to be able to read her emotions instead of just the words and images in her head, but even he could tell that she looked sad about something. It made him want to maybe tell her the truth, though when he opened his mouth he found he couldn't quite bring himself to come clean and say that he'd violated her privacy yet again.

"I glanced around your room a little, while I was in there," he said. It was akin to the truth, maybe a distant cousin to the truth.

"It's fine," she said.

Isabella looked him over, and he knew she realized that he wasn't breathing. He tried to act casual and take in a slow breath. He was such an idiot; it should have occurred to him that he might be bad enough at half truths to make her suspicious. He saw himself in her mind, a scruffy newborn, hair disheveled, doing a bad impression of someone much more collected. Without a word, she turned and went into the house.

How many times had she tested his control by just looking at him and then leaving a room? She'd sweep the damned porch or go out to her garden, focusing only on the task before her, and he always felt dismissed, but now that Bat had offered some insights, he realized that usually when she'd left him on his own he'd been angry or frightened.

"Isabella," he called.

She was inside pulling a folder of sheet music out of one of the bags.

"Here," she said, as she handed it to him.

"Why do you do that?"

"Do what?" she asked.

"Leave a room or send me away whenever I'm uncomfortable. Is that for your sake or mine?"

"What is this about, Edward?"

"Like earlier, when I called you Bella and you took off."

She sighed and surprised him by sitting down on the floor. "I don't hunt with anyone. It takes a lot of concentration, and it's… private. I was upset that you followed me when I asked you not to, and when I get upset, it tends to make others upset. So I don't know. Does that make it for you or for me?" She shrugged. "I know I'm not easy to live with, but it's just while you're waiting out the bloodlust."

He wondered if that was all he was doing. It felt like more. "I haven't smashed anything up in a week. That's a personal best." He let out a small laugh. "But it's not because you leave me alone or send me…" He was going to say _send me to my room_ , but it sounded juvenile, and he didn't want her to see him that way. "The thing is, I don't really like it when you give me space. It kind of drives me crazy."

She thought he was being polite, and she couldn't figure out why. Newborns weren't well known for their social skills.

"It's true," he said. He sank down onto his knees so that he was across from her on the floor.

She wouldn't meet his eyes. _Edward_. His name was like a breathy sigh, and he only heard it in her mind. Her thoughts were less clear, darting back and forth. She was looking for a reason to not believe him, and she was almost afraid she would find it. "You don't mean that."

He felt a quirk of irritation and fought hard to keep it from ruining this moment. Her thoughts were all over the place, but he could see in her mind that no one had ever asked her for more of her time.

"I mean it. I may be a wreck all the time, but it gets worse when you close yourself off."

 _He doesn't like it when I give him space_. She turned the thought over in her head like a rock in a tumbler, smoothing out the edges. It made no sense to her, and there was nothing to compare it to, but she met his eyes, and this time he saw himself looking back at her with something like confidence. _He means it_ , she thought, and he nodded.


	9. Laundry

"So I'm guessing washing machines were invented after you decided to go into hiding," Edward said. He was standing on the bank of a river north of the cabin holding a basket full of their clothes.

Isabella was knee deep, sitting in the current with a washboard – _a washboard for God's sake_ – and a bar of soap. He'd asked her why they couldn't just do this in the bathroom sink, and she'd said that the rushing water got the clothes cleaner. At least she hadn't left him behind. She still spent a few hours a day focusing solely on her breath or the breeze against her skin, and it still made him want to pull the legs off of something, but since Bat's visit a few weeks ago, she had stopped sending him away when the situation was tense.

"I'm not hiding." She looked up at him and smiled. "Are you going to stand there, or do you think you're up to handing me something?"

She had started to tease him once in a while. He knew from her thoughts that she'd decided he could handle it. Sometimes she was right and sometimes, not so much.

He tossed her a dress, and she scrubbed lightly, careful not to use her strength to rip the fabric. He watched her hair fall in her face and the water splash up. Though it was a little cloudy, when the sunlight would shine through, it was almost blindingly bright as it reflected off her and onto the water. Her mind shifted, and she remembered kneeling on a sandy bank to wash white linens beside a train of camels jostling past one another for a drink. A hot wind blew sand across her feet.

She kept remembering her past in random bursts lately, and he had no idea why. But when she remembered, her mind worked in a way he understood, and in those moments, he felt like he could know her. Almost since the evening Carlisle had brought him here, knowing her had become a ridiculous obsession, another want to trigger his newborn mood swings.

"Give me something to do," he said.

"You could rinse this out while I wash something else." She handed him the dress – the green one that she'd worn the first day he was here. He felt stupidly sentimental about it, which was particularly ridiculous, since he'd thrown her against a wall that day.

His sat down in the water, and Isabella shifted so that the washboard was pressed against him, and the back of her hand pushed against his thigh. Though she didn't look up from her work, he could tell she knew exactly where her hand came in contact with his jeans. He closed his eyes, and really focused on her mind. _Water rushing and the soap slipping away with the current. The four points of contact where her knuckles ran across the top of his thigh and her hand gripped the washboard. Would he notice if I moved my hand across again?_

He turned to look at her, but she focused studiously on the clothes.

It was the first time he'd been able to tell that she'd touched him on purpose.

But did he affect her, or was she just lonely?

If she'd really bothered others as much as Bat said, she'd probably gone a hell of a long time between men… or had she ever? It suddenly occurred to him that perhaps no one had been willing to stay close enough to her to have sex, at least not since she was turned, although it was possible that there were others, like him, who were alright around her as long as she wasn't actively upset. He wondered if Isabella, aroused, would be at all like Isabella, upset. Would she start to make him uneasy, or even terrified? The kiss they'd shared had been inextricably wrapped up in fear.

"…to the next one. I think that's rinsed enough." Isabella had been talking to him for who knows how long.

He was still swirling her pale green dress through the water. He wrung it out and set it in the empty basket she'd brought with them. She passed him a thin white shirt with leaves embroidered around the neck. It looked like something from the seventies. Her hand brushed across his, and though she didn't think anything of it this time, he had been counting, and she was definitely touching him a lot more than she used to.

He wrung out the shirt, careful not to shred the cotton, and leaned back to toss it in the basket. The washboard slipped from his leg, and when she righted it, she left her soapy, wet hand flat against his thigh. He waited for her to move it, but she didn't. In her mind there was just the sound and scent of rushing water. He continued to wait, suspended, but her thoughts didn't turn toward him, and her hand didn't move away. The forest could have come down while he was fixated on the slight weight of her palm pressed against him, and it occurred to him that he was just as bad as Carlisle was with Esme.

 _There's nothing else to do but watch her. That's all it is._ He repeated it to himself, but the excuse wasn't doing any good. For a moment, he actually wanted to shove her away, and yet he hated himself for the impulse, because perhaps all his thoughts centered around her because she was his… no he wasn't going to use the m word in relation to her. For one thing, Isabella would think it was ridiculous. If they were supposed to be a pair, she would have been thinking of him as well. Wasn't it always mutual when vampires found 'the one'? Or was that just the fairy tale version of it, the equivalent of the happily ever after in human stories?

He continued to rinse her clothes and breathe in the scent of verbena soap that was now inextricably linked to her in his mind. When she turned to find her blouse pressed to his nose he said, "The clothes smell good," not wanting to admit that, in fact, she smelled good.

"It's sort of a joke, really," she said. "Verbena was used to ward off vampires, but I've always been drawn to the scent." She pulled her damp hair behind her. She was wearing cutoffs with a tank top and an oversized men's flannel shirt. Maybe the mismatched assortment was the last of her clean clothes. It shouldn't have looked good on her, but the shirt was longer than the shorts, and it had made him want to groan when he'd walked here behind her.

"What?" she asked. She was confused by the look on his face and by his dark eyes. _Maybe he needs to hunt_ , she thought, _but he hunted yesterday_. She wondered if he'd had trouble finding game close enough to the cabin.

"I'm fine." He didn't mean for the words to sound defensive, but as usual, they did. She was still managing him, like he was something to tend to, a sapling in her garden. He took his shirt off and dropped it on the bank before walking farther into the water. "I'm going for a swim."

He had to walk out to the middle before the river was deep enough. The current was strong, and if he'd still been human, the bracing water would have been enough to distract him, but as it was he swam upstream in an impossible attempt to tire himself. After a few miles, he surfaced and pushed his hair back off his face. His jeans were weighted down, pulling at his hips, but he didn't think she'd appreciate it if he came back naked. Or actually, given the way he'd reacted to her lately, he was the one who probably couldn't handle that. Though he was just as connected to her mind at this distance, not being able to see her helped to clear his head a little. He climbed onto a large rock, and for a moment he thought he caught the scent of someone, but when he reached out, the only thoughts he could read were Isabella's.

She was remembering a piece by Chopin, a nocturne he'd played just the other day. It had been in the new batch of sheet music that Bat brought. She was sitting on the floor and she looked up and watched the back of him as he leaned forward, his fingers rippling over the keys as he played the piece a little faster than it should have been played.

Because she was thinking of him, he decided to start back, letting the current pull him forward as he slipped between the rocks.

The laundry was done. She'd removed her flannel shirt and was relaxing in the sun in just the pale blue tank top and jeans, her face turned upward and her long hair in waves as it dried. She was leaning on her elbows, and when he broke through the water, she pulled her head up to look at him.

For a moment he saw himself as she saw him. Soaking wet with his hair over his eyes as he watched her on the bank. He knew he looked good, but only because all of their kind were striking. Even with the white skin and the shadows beneath their eyes, they could attract their natural prey with little effort. There was an almost generic quality to their uniform good looks. When Carlisle had taken him to meet the Denali coven, the Russian sisters were each equally attractive. It did nothing for him, even when Tanya had preferred him above others of their kind. He had known right away that he wasn't Tanya's mate. Her vivid imaginings, though left unspoken, had made him uneasy. Now he stood in the current looking across the way at Isabella, wondering if he were like Tanya in this scenario – obsessing over every inch of Isabella's body while she felt nothing.

He willed her towards him, wishing for a moment that she could read his mind.

"Edward?" she asked.

Yet again he was confusing her. Through her eyes, he looked so intent and focused, as though he were hunting, but then she compared him to a wolf cub. He liked to think he was more menacing than that. To any human in this world, he was instant death, and as a newborn he was stronger than she was, but none of that mattered in her eyes; he chased prey when he shouldn't, wandered off, got into things, and then inexplicably wanted more of her time.

Edward was thankful for the mostly articulated form her thoughts were taking. If he was a puzzle to her, then at least she cared enough to want him solved.

"Edward?" she asked again. The way he was staring at her was unsettling. "What are you doing?" She got up and brushed herself off. He watched her mind balance between staying on the bank and coming out to him. After a moment, it tilted in his favor.

He should have been nervous as she got closer. Hell, everything made him edgy, and it was entirely possible that she was about to laugh in his face, or worse – let him down easy. Part of him would rather not risk anything, but she was all he could think about, and he was going to have to deal with it one way or another. And anyway, the fact that she didn't ever seem to wear a bra, and that she was chest deep in the water by the time she got to him, in that thin tank top, pretty much precluded any chance that he was going to chicken out. As soon as she was within reach, he put his arm around her waist and pulled her to him. She didn't back away or start to make him afraid, so he guessed that she didn't feel threatened, but he couldn't tell what she thought – or, to be precise, she wasn't thinking in words. She was paying careful attention to the feel of the water pushing against them on its way downstream and to the pressure of his hand where his long fingers splayed at the small of her back.

For some reason, when he pulled her even closer, he only leaned down to press his mouth to her forehead. It was a startlingly chaste gesture, not at all what he had originally intended. Her hands were still at her side, he realized, but there were words in her mind as she wondered what he would do and what _she_ should do about it. It was her uncertainty that let him know he was giving her too much time to think this through.

He brought his other hand to the side of her face and tilted her face up so he could brush his lips against hers. He felt her tense, but he pressed his tongue to her lip, and when she opened her mouth, he leaned forward so that her back arched against his arm as he deepened the kiss. The dread he'd felt the last time she had kissed him was nowhere to be found now. It was his first real kiss with his heightened senses, and it left every human memory behind as he let himself get lost in the scent and feel of her.

Isabella brought her hands up to the back of his neck. Her fingers pushed into his hair, and she opened her mouth a little more as he ran his tongue across hers. In the midst of her uncanny ability to lose herself in touch and scent, he caught the passing thought that it had been a very long time since she'd felt anything like this. He wondered how long 'a very long time' was.

As he brought his other arm to her shoulder, she let out a soft moan against his lips.

_Close, she's close. But not in the cabin._

He pulled back abruptly and looked into her eyes. She kept darting her glance back to his mouth, but then she realized something was wrong.

"I…" she started.

He shook his head, and whispered, "There's someone here."

"Here?"

"About 5 miles away. Close to the cabin."

"Don't breathe," she said.

"Not a human. Someone who's been tracking you. Are you expecting anyone?"

She shook her head.

"I'll check it out," he said.

"Don't be ridiculous." She started back toward the cabin, but stopped after a few feet. "Stay here. You get… upset. I'll let you know when to come home."

And just like that, she saw him as the erratic newborn, a favor for Carlisle. Honestly he had the urge to rip a tree out by the roots, but it would just make her think she was right, and he didn't want to see that look she got when she was being patient with him.

He let her disappear into the trees, and then he followed.


	10. Tracker

Isabella knew he was following her. Well, Edward was pretty sure that she knew. She had an image in her head of him behind her. It wasn't entirely accurate. A fast runner, he had gotten closer than she imagined.

 _Go back, Edward_.

Did she really not know him at all?

Apparently she did, because she only let out a frustrated sigh as he caught up. Her long hair flowed behind her, and he wanted to reach out so that it slid over his fingers. More than that – excited by the chase, and still turned on by the way she'd brought her hands up to his neck when he'd kissed her in the water, he wanted to pounce and roll her to the ground. He might have tried it if his senses weren't warning him to turn his attention to the intruder. Edward was only now able to catch his scent, but his mind had been clear since the river. He thought of himself as a tracker; he wasn't relying on scent or sound, but instead he had a fix on Isabella's mind. Some tenuous thread connected them, and he was focusing only on that as it led him closer.

Isabella darted left. _Don't get close to me, Edward. Don't let him know that you read minds, and don't argue with me in front of him._

"Don't tell me to back off," he hissed. "Do you know who's here?"

_I recognize his scent._

"Who is it?"

She slowed her run. The vampire ahead smelled like a sweet and earthy red wine.

 _You're too close,_ Isabella thought _. Stay away from me._

He had an immediate reaction to her thought that bordered on the violent, but he willed himself to believe that she had a good reason for 'speaking' to him like that. The reason was directly ahead, now coming to a halt as they met him in a clearing between trees near the cabin. He was tall, with thin features, and he was wearing a grey robe that was long enough to brush the tops of his now muddy black shoes.

"Demetri," Isabella said.

He inclined his head in a sort of clipped bow but made no move to come closer. His gaze flicked to Edward for just a moment, and immediately he thought _newborn_. The word seemed to sum Edward up and disregard him.

 _Stuck-up bastard_ , _how could he tell?_ It wasn't like Edward was tattooed with a big _N_ on his forehead.

"Come to the cabin. We'll talk there," Isabella said. "I assume you have a message for me?" She sounded so calm, but her thoughts were frenetic as they made their way home. She wondered if he'd come about Enkidu. She hoped that he had, but a part of her didn't want to hear what he had to say. Contradictory thoughts were nothing new to Edward; he just wasn't used to it from Isabella. He noticed that her hand was shaking, and he had the sudden urge to reach out and take it in his own. She probably would've clocked him one, so he didn't.

"Thank you for seeing me," Demetri said. He was polite almost to the point of prissy, glancing around the empty cabin, wondering how on earth she could stand to live out here.

"I assume Aro sent you?" Isabella asked.

"I came at Caius' direction, but as you know, nothing we do comes to pass without Aro having knowledge of it."

Caius, Aro – names Edward had heard from Carlisle, but the only thing he knew about the Volturi was that they would come down on him like a hammer if he went wild enough to use his strength or speed in front of a human and let them live. So far it hadn't been an issue, since he wasn't allowed near humans, and if he had been, he would've sucked them dry. Still, the Volturi had power. They were conceivably a threat to Isabella. Without thinking, he took a step closer to her.

Demetri cocked his head to the side but didn't say anything.

_Step away, Edward. Listen for once. You look too comfortable with me, and he will notice._

He wavered for a moment, but after promising himself that he would get the full story from her later, he moved back and made a point of looking like she scared him. It wasn't hard to go a little wild eyed and twitchy; he just thought of how long it had been since he felt like he was in control of his own life.

 _Newborns_ , Demetri thought, but then his mind turned to the purpose of this visit. He wanted to offer his message, get her reply, and be on his way. Whatever vibe Isabella gave off was getting to him. Demetri couldn't help thinking that she could destroy him, and it wasn't a thought he was used to having. Only with his masters, and he knew how to stay in their good graces. With Isabella, he felt at a loss. He wondered what motivated her, what would please her.

 _Good luck with that_ , Edward thought _. Damned if I know._

"Perhaps we should discuss the details in private," Demetri said.

Edward wouldn't go without a fight, and Isabella knew it. "I don't trust him on his own," she said. "He stays." The dismissive words she used to cover the truth made him flex his hand to keep from making a fist.

"As you wish," Demetri said. "Caius would like to request your assistance with maintaining the peace in India, in Karnataka." He noticed Isabella's blank expression. "You may know it by an older name – Banavasi."

She nodded. "What's the problem?"

Demetri decided to come straight out with the truth. "Werewolves."

"I've seen them before." Edward was pleased that he had something to offer. "Native Americans who –"

"Not shifters," Demetri said. "Werewolves."

"What's the difference?"

Demetri rolled his eyes, but Isabella turned to him. "They're much stronger. They only turn into wolves with the moon, and once they change they're like wild animals."

"You're serious," Edward said. "Like _An American Werewolf in London_?"

Isabella, of course, had no idea what he was talking about, and Demetri ignored him.

"Now you see why Caius was the one to send me here. Since he was nearly killed by one, he takes it seriously."

"Of course," Isabella said. "But why does he need me?"

"I can't track them. Someone is shielding them."

Isabella put a hand out to the wall to steady herself, and Edward caught the image in her mind of a rough looking man with black hair and a cape similar to the one Demetri was wearing, but darker. "You think Enkidu is involved?" she asked.

"We managed to catch a female who was on her own. Caius interrogated her himself. She told him that there were a dozen of them traveling together."

"They don't do that."

"She said there was a vampire that led them, and that they felt drawn to him."

 _No_ , Isabella thought.

"Now you see why we've come to you for help. There have been attacks all around what is now the Anshi National Park. Most are mangled corpses, but some are only being bitten, and we suspect they're joining the ranks. If you're willing to assist us, I've had these prepared." He pulled out a folder to show her a map and other documents including what looked like an entry visa to India in her name. He handed them over. "If we could get a photograph, I'll arrange the passport as well," he said.

Isabella looked over the papers before setting them on the piano bench. "I can't help you," she said.

"Surely you see the need, and you understand why it's you who must go."

"Must go?" She took a few steps toward him. "It's not up to you to tell me anything." She seemed to grow taller. Her pale facing was stern and shining with a fierce determination that made Demetri back up until he hit the wall.

 _Holy mother of God_ , even Edward felt Isabella's influence then. The room practically buzzed with menace, and he had no idea why she was so upset. This time, the step he took away from her was completely unintentional, and he felt guilty and maybe a little embarrassed about it as soon as he knew what he'd done, but who could be near her when she was lit up like that?

Demetri, who had already been having a hard time just handling a reasonably calm Isabella, slid left toward the door, ready to bolt. "I apologize," he said. "I meant no disrespect." He was balancing his desire to flee with his fear of returning without more information for his master. "Is there some reason you would like me to give to Caius?" he managed to ask.

"Tell him that I'm responsible for a newborn, and he can't be left on his own." She sighed, and the tension in the room deflated enough that Demetri was able to lift his head to look at her. "Tell him he can send word if the situation gets worse." She walked to the piano and tore a corner off of the map she'd been given, and then used a stubby pencil from the kitchen drawer to write her cell phone number. "I'll check messages about once a week," she said. "If you need to reach me, use that. He will not send another guard here. Make sure he understands that."

Edward actually enjoyed the nervous mess that was Demitri's mind as he tried to understand why she wouldn't just drop Edward off with someone else. Anyone could look after him, but handling Enkidu required her help specifically. Still, Demetri wasn't about to voice his opinion. He had a healthy sense of self preservation, so he murmured his understanding of her instructions and fled backwards out the door.

Isabella sat down on the bench, and for a long time neither of them said anything. Eventually her shoulders relaxed and her hands were still in her lap.

"What did he do to upset you so much?" Edward asked.

"He didn't do anything. It's just better to make the Volturi think they're on thin ice, so they'll leave me alone. They're like the Romanians before them. Always someone who wants to make the rules. Besides, if Enkidu really is in India, I can find him on my own eventually. I'm not going to be a Volturi bulky unless I have to."

"A _bulky_?"

"You know, an enforcer of the law, like the police. Do you not use that word anymore?"

"Never heard of it." Now that she wasn't making him crazy, he took a seat next to her on the bench. "How do you manage to speak without sounding outdated anyway?" he asked.

"Battery powered radio."

"I've never heard you listen to one."

"I only need to catch up every decade or so." She nudged him with her elbow. "And I don't need it at all now, do I? Not with you here."

They sat for a while. Isabella tried to feel her weight against the bench and the breath moving in and out of her lungs, doing nothing more than bringing in Edward's scent. To her, he smelled like cardamom and sandalwood, and Edward had had no idea until then that she wanted to breathe him in. He didn't really give a rat's ass about the Volturi or about werewolves on the other side of the earth; he just wanted to kiss her again, to erase the tension from the thin line of her lips pressed tight together, so that she opened to him and thought of nothing else.

But she kept seeing Enkidu in her mind.

"Do you want to go after him?" he asked. It was a stupid question; he wasn't even close to being ok with her leaving.

"Don't worry. I've got my hands full here."

He wondered why it didn't occur to her to that anyone could keep an eye on him. But then, given the fiasco with Esme, maybe it was too much to expect of most.

"Why do they think this guy they're looking for is the one who changed you?" he asked.

She wondered how he knew Enkidu had bitten her, and then she realize Bat must've told him. "Enkidu is immune to trackers. He's immune to a lot of things. It's like there's no one there. And he can share that immunity," she said. "The Volturi also know that predatory animals gravitate to him. It's not actually a talent; it's a fairly common trait among those who became vampires before man domesticated the first wolves. Since werewolves are normally our enemies, it would have to be one of the old ones for them to follow."

"Why do animals avoid you then?"

She sucked in a breath and stood up. "For one thing, I'm not nearly that old, and for another… they seem to pick up on the same thing about me that bothers our kind."

"The thing that makes everyone nervous around you."

She nodded.

"That's why you didn't want Demetri to see that I can be close to you."

She looked uncomfortable. "The Volturi don't need to know that you seem to be… somehow less affected by me than most."

'Less affected' was not how Edward would have described it.

"If they believed there was any chance that you could help them control me," she said, "they'd take advantage of it, probably in a way that was more dangerous for you than for me. As far as I'm concerned, the less they know the better."

This time it was Edward's turn to have his mouth hang open. "Did you seriously just answer all my questions?"

"What do you mean?"

"Miss I-don't-talk-about-anything-personal. You just answered me." He reached to pull her down beside him on the bench, but she slipped away from him.

"I talk," she said, but her eyes were wide, as though he'd startled her.

"No, you don't. I must have softened you up at the river."

"Aren't you sure of yourself."

He certainly wanted her to think he was. They stared at one another for a long moment.

"I am not soft," she whispered. "I can't be."

She moved to the far wall and asked him to play something for her. He wanted to believe he had the power to relax her, but she kept thinking of Enkidu. If not for the way he was scowling in every image in her mind, Edward would have been jealous. He put it out of his head long enough to play through much of the sheet music he had, and then they set off in the dark to collect the forgotten laundry.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For more on werewolves in Twilight and the Volturi's attempt to wipe them out, visit the Twilight Saga Wiki at http://twilightsaga.wikia.com/wiki/Children_of_the_Moon


	11. Gravity

It was time to face the fact that some essential part of him had turned itself over and shifted. The change had been humming through him in the river when he'd leaned over Isabella, pressing her backwards with his mouth while he pulled her close, but Edward knew that it had probably sparked to life the night Carlisle brought him here and she'd stepped out on her porch to look him over.

He'd be the first to admit he wasn't great at self reflection, but at this point, even he could feel that his center of gravity lay outside himself. The need to be near her was as strong for him as the need to be away from her seemed to be for others. He didn't care why. As long as she didn't dial up the volume on that deep seated dread she could inspire, he wanted to be where she was. Maybe time would help him master her pull over him in the same way it was supposed to help him control his lust for human blood, but right now he couldn't even master frustration as he sat across from her on the roof.

There had to be something to this silent ritual Isabella performed nearly every day, but damned if Edward could figure it out. Yes, he could feel the weight of his thighs and his butt on the roof. No, he couldn't keep his mind on the sensation for more than ten seconds without some random thought popping into his head. But so what? What the hell was the point?

When he had returned from a hunt this morning to find her on top of the house again, looking like some ridiculously shiny Christmas angel, he'd gone inside to take a shower, and then he'd leapt up through the hole in her room. She didn't move or frown at his approach, so he'd watched her for a while in the sunshine until he had the impulse to settle in with her, both of them cross legged and facing one another. Her eyes were closed, but of course, her mind was still open to him. He tried to make his own mind mirror hers, if only to see what it was that could possibly enthrall her for hours on end.

 _Breathing in. The warmth of the sun. Right hand pressing into the palm of the left…_ _If Demetri hadn't shown up I would've moved my hand down from the small of her back and –_

Sitting still was a waste of time as far as he could tell. Though his body could do it indefinitely, his mind would not cooperate. Instead of his current breath, he thought about his hunt, how a herd of deer had been closer to the cabin than he'd expected. For a while he wondered why the Volturi believed that Isabella could help them stop Enkidu. Then his mind moved back to their kiss. Everything kept revolving around to that kiss. It had been four days and nights since then, and each time he came near her, she had some maddening thought, like _Will he try it again?_ that made him think she might reject him.

_Breathing out._

At least she'd opened up a little. He'd asked her how she had suspected, even before Demetri said anything, that Enkidu was the reason for the visit the other day, and she hadn't looked away or brushed him aside. She'd just told him that the Volturi had agreed, back in the 1700's, to let her know if Enkidu turned up.

_Breathing out. Had he not noticed breathing in?_

She was so close that when the wind caught her hair, it almost brushed against his shoulder. It was infuriating that he could sprint like a steam train and know the thoughts around him, but he couldn't make his mind stay still the way she could.

He caught her scent on the breeze, and got the bright idea to use his obsession to his advantage. Instead of his own breath, he would watch hers. Instead of his own sensations, he would feel and hear through her mind. Immersing himself in her thoughts was one of the few things he could actually do well and consistently. He matched her, breath for breath, settling himself into her rhythm. She felt the breeze flutter her shirt against her bare skin. There were no words in her mind. There weren't really words for the details that she noticed anyway. The wind picked up and the fabric brushed against her and lifted. She had her attention on her shoulders and her chest, but Edward was solely focused on her breasts, and it was possible that twenty minutes went by with only her sensations passing through his mind, until eventually she opened her eyes.

"Hey," he said.

She watched him, noticing the way his hair was ruffled by the wind, and she thought he looked calmer than she'd ever seen him before. Less like a deer ready to run.

_Great. First she compared him to a wolf cub, and now he was a deer._

Whatever peace he'd found evaporated, but he could show her that he wouldn't bolt. His weight tilted onto his knees as he used his hand to push himself toward her.

Her breaths grew short and her eyes widened. _Who's the deer now_? he wanted to ask _._ He looked at her slightly parted lips and back to her eyes. She blinked as she realized what he intended, and she wondered whether to stay or to flee.

 _Oh no you don't_. He could get somewhere with her if he didn't let her think it through. He uncrossed his legs and ended up on his knees above her. His mouth came down on hers while she wavered. She opened to him then, her lips soft and even shy - such a surprise for Edward to find himself the aggressor - and he moaned. Hearing him, her doubts rushed in again, but he leaned forward so far that it forced her back onto the roof until she lay pinned beneath him.

He didn't think she was going to use her ability on him. There was no dread, no voice telling him that she'd end him any moment. She shivered under him, trying to contain herself, but he was determined to make her come undone. He deepened the kiss, tasting her mouth, and he brought his hands to her wrists and pulled her arms up so that her fingers curled into his hair. She tugged him closer, and he knew he had her. More and more, lately, she was thinking in ways he understood, like now when she tugged at his lower lip and thought she would like to bite it. She didn't, so he bit down lightly on hers instead and pressed his tongue to her teeth to keep her distracted as he slipped his hand under her shirt and traced above her navel. He brushed his fingers along her ribs. She let him. He felt a rush of power, and then he held her breast in his palm.

It wasn't until that moment, as everything fit into place, that he understood the depths of his usual agitation. Right here was where he was meant to be, pulled down to crash into her. Anywhere else, he was a mess. He brushed over her nipple, and she arched up, causing the edge of the bronze blade around her neck to swing over his hand. The strength of her reaction startled her. When he moved to lift her shirt, he could hear her mind flick back to the sort of thoughts he understood _. I should stop. He doesn't even know what he's doing half the time. He'll get upset and -_

"I'm not going to flip out," he said. His jaw ground tight from the force of biting down on his words.

"Show me," she said. "If I tell you to stop, can you do it without a tantrum?"

"I'm not a child. I'm losing my temper more from your attitude than anything else." He flopped down beside her on his back. "Just forget it."

His breath was still timed to hers, and they were panting as they lay next to one another. One day he would have to ask Carlisle why their breath would stupidly race. It served no purpose, and yet he couldn't stop.

He didn't expect her to reach out and take his hand. He turned and found her staring at their twined fingers in what looked like surprise. Then she lay back again and looked up at the sky.

"It's been a long time since anything made me feel uncertain," she said.

He wanted to snort in disgust. What was there to be unsure about? But the answers were in her mind. He was young. So incredibly young. He opened his mouth to swear that he was getting better, getting some control over himself so that not every urge was able to knock him sideways anymore, but apparently his violent nature wasn't her only concern.

"I did things when I was a newborn that I should never have done," she said. "Probably unforgiveable things, though I have come to the place where I've forgiven myself anyway, if only because there was no one else to do it, and without some forgiveness I might have gone mad." She gripped his hand tighter. "Right now you can remember every moment from the last two years, but imagine what it will be like when every mistake over the millennia will stay with you always, or at least until the sun burns up this world and us along with it." Her thumb ran a rhythmic path back and forth along his knuckles. "I'm not saying that anything you and I do together would cause you that kind of regret, but I think you're too new to know what you want until your emotions settle and you have full control over yourself."

A low growl rumbled from his throat before he could stop it.

"See." She rolled toward him and held his hand in both of hers. "Even the knowledge that you're temperamental makes you start to lose control."

Edward thought that the force of will it was taking to not bare his teeth at her now should have been enough to convince anyone that he was a saint. "When you're close to me, I'm less out of control," he said in the most even tone he could manage. "That means something."

Their breathing had slowed. Blue sky flashed through the clouds, and sunlight shone off the both of them again, so insufferably bright that he was surprised it couldn't give him a headache. He wanted to go inside, but he was tied to her, moving where she moved. She was thinking about waking up, reemerging from a hazy dream to the sharp edges of real life, and he had no idea what the hell she was on about. Their kind didn't sleep. Whatever she was thinking, it seemed unlikely to lead to his skin on hers.

 _Not a dream_ , she thought. _Swëtïan._

"I don't understand you," he said. "What does that even mean?"

"They're my own thoughts, Edward. Please tell me you aren't asking me to think them in some context for your sake."

"Well, what does swëtïan mean at least?" He couldn't tell her that he'd seen the word scrawled in her journal.

"It's nothing. Old English. 'To be sweet'."

 _Be sweet, Bella. Be calm._ He remembered the chant from her hunt.

"I want to call you Bella."

"Why?" She scrambled backwards, stood up and took a step backwards so that she was higher on the roof, looking down at him.

"It's how you think of yourself, how you sooth yourself. Besides, Isabella is formal and long. It makes me think of Queen Isabella sending Columbus off in a boat."

She looked away. "Names are nothing; I change them every few hundred years." She was working hard to get that dismissive tone just right; he could tell. "Call me whatever you like. But now…" She took a deep breath and turned back to him. "Can you give me an hour or so on my own?"

"No."

"Edward." Her voice was soft, but he didn't let it fool him.

"No."

She put a hand on her hip, and stared him down. He had a feeling she would take off for who knew how long if he didn't change his mind. Then he'd have no control over when she returned.

"I've already hunted," he said, "but I guess I could go call Carlisle."

It was far enough that she could have a moment to think on her own with no Edward in her mind, though he wondered what she'd need to hide from him. Maybe the lack of privacy affected her more than he'd thought.

She leapt down, and he followed her into the house. She didn't watch him or think about him as he left, and he threw open the door and ran like he was bearing down on prey. There was a freedom in going all out, even if it was moving him away from her while a considerable part of him ached to go back until he was flush against her. If he could give her a few minutes alone, it could show her that he had a hold on himself. He wouldn't be gone long. The forest blurred into streaks of brown and green, the bright lime of new growth and the deep forest-black of older evergreens. He stopped short of the cliff face that he'd tumbled over before.

He would be lucky if he could concentrate on what Carlisle had to say. He thought about asking to speak to Esme and winced at the thought of the conversation that would follow. He _should_ ask. With any luck maybe she wouldn't want to talk to him. He punched in the numbers on the worn out phone.

There was a rustle of sound in the distance that didn't fit. He turned away from the cliff to face it. There were thoughts in the trees, and they were moving in quickly.

Carlisle's voice sounded at his feet, and he realized dimly that he'd dropped the phone.

He didn't know who was here. It wasn't a mind he recognized. If he were human, he might have been curious, but his newborn senses were honed to recognize a threat. He felt danger vibrate in every cell of his body, and he didn't bother to growl or raise himself to his full height. He was fast and he knew it, so he set off in a sprint. He could outrun most anything.

He hadn't made it far before he felt another mind in front of him, and another, closing in from the side.

A shudder ran through him, but he couldn't afford to panic. Everything seemed to slow down, and he told himself to be calm. It was the oddest thing. _Calm down, Edward._ He could almost hear it in Bella's soft chant. The minds were circling and closing in on him now, near enough that he picked up scent as well. He didn't think he could switch directions enough to escape them. He might have to stand and fight.

 _Get ready. Make yourself be calm_ , he thought. He came to a halt and dropped into a defensive position. _Be calm._ He was outnumbered, but there was no way in hell he was going to be sweet.


	12. Past / Present

**PART 2**

The phone lay on the ground.

There was a sour, animal scent that made Bella ache to hiss at nothing, but sound would serve no purpose, so she held it in. Edward's scent was too weak to follow, and all signs of him and his attackers ended at the river.

Someone was going to be begging for mercy soon.

It had been a few hundred years since she'd faced a moment like this, but her tendons and her muscles remembered how to react, and her mind had never forgotten.

First, she had to recharge the phone. Since there was no trail left to follow, she ran her hand over the piano keys and then sat down on the bench and focused on breathing evenly while she waited. Anyone who saw her might have thought she cared nothing about the newborn being taken from her, but the concentration kept her mind sharp and ready. After an hour, when her phone was working again, the old blacksmith was her first call. Bat didn't even sound surprised when she told him. Like her, his personality had been forged by the frequent and violent loss of those around him, and he didn't waste her time.

"What do you need?" he asked.

"I need travelling papers, and I need you to stay at the cabin in case whoever took him tries to contact me."

"You'll need more than that. The world has changed. Do you even know what currency they're using now?"

"The world always changes. I'll manage."

"You'd be a – you'd be unwise to go it alone when you don't have to."

"I need you to wait at the cabin," she said, "and I won't ask Carlisle to come with me; he may have the best talent of all of us, but where I'm going, they don't respect compassion."

Bat sighed, long and impatient. "I can guess where the hell you're going. Take my granddaughter. She'll keep the tracker on the straight and narrow and let you know if he tries to pull one over on you."

"Ginnlaug won't want to come."

"She'll do it. If there's one thing Vikings understand, it's a life debt. She owes you just as much as I do."

"If she's willing, she'll have to come straight away. I won't wait."

Bella heard papers shuffling on the other end of the line. "You'll need to sit tight until I can get there anyway," Bat said, "and I'll be there tomorrow night if I can get in touch with the forger right away. Ginnie will be with me."

Tomorrow night. That left about thirty hours before she could make a move. If Edward wasn't already in pieces, it meant that someone wanted him alive. She tasted venom in her mouth and had to trust that the delay wouldn't make a difference.

Her next call was to Carlisle. He listed the times of flights out of Seattle. There was yet another newborn with him, a young woman named Rosalie, but the coven in Alaska would open their home to her and to Esme if need be. At any other time Bella might have teased him about his newfound drive to increase the world's population of vampires, but she had more important concerns. How could she tell the strongest man she knew that he would be a liability?

"Perhaps you should stay in Forks," she said, "in case Edward is making his way to you."

Silence from her phone.

"Carlisle?"

It was always strange talking to people at a distance. Beyond the reach of her unsettling influence, they behaved differently than they did in person, and she wasn't always sure how to read them. Carlisle was quick to understand nuance, and she wondered if his silence meant that he already suspected the real reason she wanted him to stay at home.

"Was there any sign that he left of his own free will?" he asked.

There wasn't. In fact, all signs indicated that there had been a fight, and she had yet to tell anyone about the sour animal smell or her fear that it was the scent of a werewolf. Having never encountered one before, she couldn't be sure, so she decided not to cause him extra stress.

After several moments of waiting for her to answer, Carlisle said, "You think you stand a better chance of getting Edward back if I stay behind."

He always saw to the heart of things.

"I may need to persuade the Volturi that it's in their best interest to help me. I don't know how far I'll have to take it. If you're there, I might hesitate. Bat's granddaughter can help with minor details like money and the airport. She can sense a lie, so she'll be useful in Volterra."

"You're going for Demetri?" he guessed.

She nodded, though of course he couldn't see. "Whether or not the Volturi are behind this, I need a tracker. If Demetri tries to lead me astray, Ginnlaug will know."

"I understand."

He really sounded as though he did, and she was grateful for that. Guilt would only slow her down.

"I'll fix this," she said. "I should never have let him out of my sight while he was my responsibility, but if he's alive, I will bring him back for you."

Her phone batteries were dying, and it wasn't long before she found herself alone in the silent cabin with another twenty-nine hours before Bat and Ginnlaug were supposed to arrive. She went upstairs and thumbed through a few of Edward's architecture books. He didn't spend that much time in here, but there was the scent of him – an unnamed, heady warmth like sandalwood. His duffle bag was saturated with it, and she pulled it onto her lap.

_Edward, I'm going to fix this._

He was only supposed to be a favor, straight forward and uncomplicated. She understood favors. She'd bartered everything from blood and sex in Europe to goats and gold in the Middle East, and favors were just an affectionate sort of bartering between friends. They didn't require accounting. For friends – and there were precious few of those – she would help even if she received nothing in return. So when Carlisle had been forced to push Edward out of the nest, she'd agreed to look after him.

Like all newborns, he was edgy and defensive, and he stared a lot. It had taken her just two days, three chess moves and one brush against his knee to realize that he was a threat, a stone dropped into her still pond.

She'd survived by observing repetition and cycles, by knowing what to expect from cities, from the wilderness, from ruling covens and shifting alliances. She'd relied on the breath, the warmth of prey, the dirt under her nails when she turned the earth, the rush of water on the washboard. She had learned a long time ago to pay attention to sensation so that she could keep her brain from overloading. Then Edward tugged her out of complacency.

She shook her head to clear it and left his room for her own. As always, her eyes were drawn to the urn that had been buried with her mother. Though it was a symbol of violence and bloodshed, she set it aside with careful reverence. It was the only thing that remained, unless she counted the concoctions her mother had taught her: lavender, chervil, valerian, and yarrow, brewed in a tea, could combat fevered dreams, and foxglove, which her mother had only used once, made sleep last forever. One memory bled into another: the weight of an abandoned fledgling in the hand felt as heavy as a river stone one fourth its size. She knew how to set the leg of an injured lamb, though it had been thousands of years since she'd copied her mother by trying to work her healing on animals. She could barely get close to them now, and as prey, they were right to fear her.

She closed the lid on the window seat, but the memories kept coming. There were detailed recollections from after the change, like the fishermen who sieved the Nile using nets that wriggled fat and silver with fish whose scales smelled sharp like a tin can and soft like the body of a woman. Once dead, their stench was too disgusting to equate with anything other than decay. In the end, everything decayed except her own kind, who could only be destroyed by severing the head. Unless it was already charred in the fire, a vampire could still see even after the brain had been separated from the body. Enkidu had shown her that. His defeated foes' eyes would dart over to their headless bodies in alarm and disbelief. She tried to drive the image away, but other bitter lessons replaced it. She remembered that blood offered freely tasted the same as blood taken by force.

_Enough._

It was better shut it out than to let the past make her feel things that would leave her weak. She'd gotten so good at it until Edward crashed into her life. Now there was memory and yearning and hopes that were best left unexamined.

There was still more than a day left to wait, but she stowed a few things in a backpack and then went for a hunt. She realized how unsettled she was when it took her three hours to get herself into a calm enough state to surprise a stag. Afterwards, she sat on the roof, the last place she'd been with Edward, and the point with the clearest lookout, until she heard the steady thrum of an engine in the distance. She set out towards the sound. Ginnlaug was leaning against a slim blue car and looking off into the trees, but Bat gave Bella a swift pat on the arm and handed her an envelope full of papers.

"Is there anything I need to know?" he asked.

"Nothing. I don't think Edward will be back here on his own, but keep an eye out. I assume Ginnlaug has a phone?" she asked.

"Ginnie. I haven't been Ginnlaug in about nine hundred years. And of course I have a phone."

Bella ignored her and turned back to Bat. "You know where to go to get reception. I'll check in with you when I can. Or you can call Ginnie."

He nodded. "Don't hesitate to put Caius in his place. You know he doesn't like anyone who remembers a time before Volturi rule."

"He hates werewolves even more than his elders. I can use that if I need to."

"Are we going or not?" Ginnie asked. "We have a flight out of Dulles that leaves in five hours."

"She's a pain in the ass sometimes, but it's just chatter. She will be of use to you," Bat said.

Bella opened the passenger door to throw her backpack onto the seat. "How far is this city?"

"Several hours. And Dulles is an airport, not a city. Do you even know what state we're in?" Ginnie asked.

"Does the land have border lines across it? What do I care what humans call the ground I walk on?"

That was enough to shut Ginnie up, and she went around to the driver's side and got in. After a minute she rolled the window down. "Morfar," she called, and Bat went over. Though she was still pouting, her face softened when he came up, and she leaned out to kiss him on the chin.

"Don't get yourself in trouble," Bat told her, "and don't forget what you owe Isabella."

She nodded and rolled up her window.

The air in the car was colder than the air outside. It smelled of tannin and cow hide and an unusual chemical stench that had her wrinkling her nose.

"New car smell." Ginnie tapped the dashboard. "Vinyl." She threw an arm over the back of Bella's seat and did a quick three point turn to head them in the opposite direction.

They didn't speak for a long while, but the car had a radio, and it pumped out a rhythmic beat. Bella watched the landscape shift quickly as it passed. Humans had found a way to move almost as fast as she did. Given time there seemed to be little they couldn't invent, which was strange given their short lives. They built upon the work of the ones who came before them, and she admired that, even if she didn't always like the results.

Ginnie was tapping her long fingernails against the wheel she used to steer the car. Every so often, her wispy white hair would tickle across her forehead, and she'd tug it back by running her fingers through it and then checking her reflection in the mirror that hung in front of the glass.

"What does Morfar mean?" Bell asked.

"Hmmm?"

"You called Bat Morfar."

"Grandfather," she said. "Specifically mother's father. Why?"

"I was just wondering. I've only ever heard him called Bat or Völundr."

"Well, it's not like you'd have a reason to call him grandfather," Ginnie said. She fiddled with a lever by the wheel and they pulled off the four lane road and onto a smaller street, where they rolled to a stop.

Bella looked over at her, and the blonde popped the cap back on a tube she'd used to repaint her lips a light pink.

"What?" Ginnie asked. "It's a red light. I'm stopping because we have to."

"I didn't say anything."

"Well don't. Trust me to know what I'm doing." She reached into the glove compartment and pulled out a band to hold her hair back.

"I've seen traffic lights. I visited a town about twenty years back."

"Well great, you're an expert then."

Bella found it easy to shut out Ginnie's unsettled irritation, but she let herself focus on it anyway. Something small like that could take her mind off larger issues until they arrived in Volterra.

The airport had high ceilings but was otherwise purely functional. The heated scent of human food poured out of shops along the way to where they would get on an airplane. Music or announcements came out of the walls. There were a lot of people moving quickly (for them) and with purpose. They gave her a wide berth whenever possible. They weren't as wary as other animals though; humans were easily distracted and seemed less inclined to act on instinct. She took a good look at them. They were plumper and wearing a lot less clothes than she remembered. Many of the women wore pants, and she was pleased to see that everyone appeared to be free. That had not been the case when she'd last spent any serious amount of time around people, and she'd never liked servitude.

She had to show her passport again and again. There was a time when nothing held people back from roaming except a lack of transport. She felt a tinge of resentment at their attempt to control her movements, but it wasn't a useful emotion, so she let it go and moved quietly through the lines.

Once on the plane, she closed her window shade, but a woman came by and asked her to open it again.

"Because of 9-11," Ginnie said, but then she shook her head. "Never mind. Just leave it up for now."

For the sake of getting Edward back, Bella was willing to put aside the fact that, as far as she understood, airplanes could break apart and catch fire in the air – an event that could accomplish both of the things it took to make a vampire cease to exist. She didn't actually know how they'd managed to make something this big lift off the ground. She could have asked Ginnie, but it didn't really matter. Apparently, like everything else they wanted, humans had found a way to make it happen. The only thing they didn't seem to be able to do was live long.

Bella smelled sweat and cologne and food more disgusting than anything that had assaulted her before now. Pictures flickered above her head and showed her the image of the belt Ginnie had made her tighten across her lap. Compartments opened and snapped shut, and the murmur of human voices blended together over the music that played even here. She let the sounds blend into a mass of undefined static, and beneath it she heard her own mantra. For once it wasn't saying _calm_.

 _Edward_ , it said. _Edward, I'm coming_. _Don't let it be too late._

Edward didn't fear her unless she concentrated on it, and he didn't listen, but when he touched her, she didn't want him to listen. She'd had a perverse longing to lay under him and feel safe. Ridiculous to want that when he couldn't even take care of himself. She was supposed to be keeping him out of danger for Carlisle, and look what a great job she'd done of that. _But I'm coming, Edward, and once I find you, there's nothing anyone can do to stop me from taking you back._

Ginnie had been looking at pictures of makeup in some reading material at her seat, but now she set it aside with a huff.

"You're driving me absolutely insane, and we haven't even taken off, you know that?"

"I'm making you afraid?" Bella asked.

"You know you are, Isabella. It was almost bearable in the car. Now it's off the charts. Are you upset or something?"

"I haven't been in the air before. I'm letting it bother me, that's all."

Ginnie turned sideways in her seat, and for a moment she sputtered. "You– You're lying to me? Seriously? I've left everything behind to go on this wild goose chase with you, and I accept that I'm supposed to owe you a life debt, but Jesus, we all know that you used the worst possible method to get me to leave Santa Fe, and even if you hadn't there's always the chance I would have made it out on my own, so I can't believe you're going to sit there and spout off shit you don't mean when we aren't even on our way yet, because how am I supposed to help you when I can't trust what you tell me, even though I'm probably putting my existence in your hands, which, by the way, I am only doing because my grandfather will never accept gifts, and this, this of all things, is what he actually wanted, so fine, here I am, but at least have the guts to be straight with me."

Bella wondered if it were really a good thing that vampires didn't need to breathe.

"I apologize," she said. "I didn't think you required a complete answer. I'm worried about the newborn as well."

Ginnie relaxed slightly at the sound of the truth. "I don't need to know every little thing. Just don't screw with me." She opened her magazine and started flicking pages back and forth, though she wasn't looking at them. "This kid we're after, he's only a couple of years old right?"

Bella let a long, stale breath move in and back out of her lungs. "If you want me to stop frightening you, I should probably not talk about this for a while. Don't take it personally."

"Do what you gotta do. I'm going to find somewhere else to sit. I don't mean to be a bitch, but you're making me want to wrench a door off and jump out of the plane."

Bella nodded and closed her eyes. She felt her elbows on the padded arm rest and her feet flat on the floor. Beneath them was carpet and metal and clouds. She let that image go, and refused to think of Edward, held captive, somewhere below.

She felt her breath moving in and out and prepared herself to bring the Volturi to heel.


	13. Truth  / Lies

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Belindella for the pre-read on this chapter.

"I'm not going in there."

Ginnie stayed seated in the driver's side of the little yellow car that had brought them from Florence to this cobblestone alley where they were now stopped. The windows had fogged and there was a constant tapping that sounded like pebbles into a pan. It was raining in dull, steady sheets, and Bella could hear thunder in the distance.

"You came all this way, but you won't go a little farther? Your grandfather led me to believe that you were going to be useful."

Ginnie's grip on the wheel tightened. "I was – I did – I got you this far. I know it's only been a century since you paid attention, but a lot's happened in the world, in case you hadn't noticed. Or did you think you were just going to walk up to a counter with no money and say, 'Hello, I want to ride in your air flying machine to the land of Caesars'? For God's sake, Isabella! Not helpful? Give me a break."

"Anyone could have accompanied me here. What I need now is something only you can do."

"And again, I can hear you lying."

"Your talent is too literal," Bella said. "Obviously, you're not the only one on this earth who could help me discover what the Volturi intend, but you're the only one who's here with me." She opened the car door, and the rain blew in and spotted her jeans. "You're stalling. Or you're waiting to find out if I'm going to force you to go in."

"Are you?" Ginnie's voice was barely a whisper.

"I'm not."

Ginnie leaned forward and rested her forehead on the wheel, choking out a breath that sounded like a sob.

"Why are you afraid of this place?" Bella asked.

"Why wouldn't I be? They're the goddamned Volturi."

Bella shrugged. "Before them it was the Romanians, and further back it was a handful of Egyptians who called themselves the Daughters of Set. Eventually it will be someone else."

"You just don't get it," Ginnie said. "Except for my grandfather, everyone I was close to is dead because of them. Nikolai, Joseph, Sal, Anko…" She stopped to catch her breath. "Nikolai." The name came out like a prayer. "He was supposed to live forever, but they're all gone with nothing to mark the place where they were burned. Killed in one night, because the Volturi decided that we pushed too hard, showed our hand too much in Santa Fe."

"You must have known the Volturi might come," Bella said. "They had already ended the fighting in Texas."

"My people were warriors. It's a gift to die on the field. And Nikolai… he was a determined bloody Bolshevik, a gorgeous fucking fighting machine, and nothing could stop him when he felt he was in the right. We would have taken the Volturi on in a fair fight. But they had their freaks that render everyone helpless, and they massacred Nikolai and the rest for something that wasn't our fault. It was the other side that got careless, letting their newborns raid the city like it was a snack bar. But it didn't matter. When the Volturi decide it's time for you to die, then you die.

"So, you want to know what I'm afraid of? I'm afraid they know I was in New Mexico, and they'll decide I've gone too long without paying for it. I'm afraid they'll resent my helping you. Most of all I'm afraid that they'll want me stuck in the guard interrogating the truth out of prisoners." She leaned back and hit her head against the seat a few times and closed her eyes. "Don't make me go in there."

"Ginnie." No response. The girl was almost hyperventilating. "Ginnlaug, look at me."

She opened her eyes, but still faced forward while her breathing slowed.

"I'm going in now. Try to settle yourself. I'll be back with the tracker, and then we'll leave."

Bella stepped out into the downpour. The air smelled of moss and stone, and the lights in the windows were steady, not flickering with firelight as she remembered. She headed east for the Rocca Vecchia, the 'old fortress'. It wasn't that much older than the western side, but since it came first, it was considered more historic, and Carlisle had said that it was through the large wooden door on the east that tourists were herded in and then up to the second floor.

She rapped on the red door with the cast iron ring nailed to the center, but other than a dull buzzing sound, nothing happened. She waited and then knocked again.

The young woman who eventually let her in was human. She took one look at Bella and opened the door fully to reveal a bright room with beige carpet and wallpaper.

"Buonasera. Posso prendere il cappotto?"

"Buonasera. Do you speak English?" Bella asked.

"Of course. I'm sorry about the door." The girl moved quickly to put a huge desk between herself and Bella. "I tried to buzz you in," she continued, "but perhaps it isn't working. Do you have an appointment?"

"I don't. Please tell them that Isabella has come from the United States of America."

The girl chewed on the tip of her pen and looked doubtful, but she made the call. After several minutes, a tall woman in Volturi robes came to collect Bella and lead her to an elevator. She had auburn hair - almost the shade of her eyes - pulled into a sleek chignon. "I'm sorry for the delay in the lobby," she said. "Aro wasn't expecting you."

"I'm here to speak with Caius, actually."

The woman looked startled, but perhaps it was only the effect of being in the enclosed space of an elevator with Bella. Then again, anyone who drank human blood tended to be less than stable in Bella's experience; it was possible that her behavior had little to do with Bella's gift.

"They're both in the main hall, so you will have an audience with Caius as well."

"Fine." Already Bella felt weary at the thought of dealing with Aro. Caius was, if possible, even more of a bastard, but at least he didn't pretend to be anything else.

After they slipped through a side panel along one of the institutional looking halls, the castle revealed its true self – stone and dark and the hint of damp. The main hall was exactly as Bella remembered. There were the thrones: three imposing lacquered chairs, designed to reinforce a sense that the Volturi had always had some rightful claim to power. The room smelled of blood and of rain. The damp slipped in through the slit windows high on the wall. It trickled down the stone in darkened tracks and wetted the dried blood on the floor. Bella had the urge to stop breathing, less from bloodlust than from the stale smell of old blood in layer upon layer. The place reeked of fear and murder.

"Welcome, Isabella," Aro said. He'd come forward, casting a quick glance at the woman who'd brought her here, and immediately Bella felt an unnatural feeling of camaraderie drift over her.

"Whatever you're doing to me, you will stop," Bella said. She let her anger go a little, enough to change the mood in the room.

Aro looked decidedly less pleased than he had a moment before. "That will be all, Chelsea," he told her, and the woman gave him a curt nod before backing away.

"I apologize," Aro said. "Chelsea hasn't gained full control of her talent yet. She sometimes influences others toward friendship without intending to."

If Ginnie had come inside, she probably would have been rolling her eyes at the lie, but Aro's attempts at manipulation were so blatant and expected that Bella could only have been surprised if he _hadn't_ tried to influence her.

"You are a long way from your roots, Villanovan," she said.

Nothing closed Aro's mouth faster than a reference to his humble beginnings. The Volturi liked to style themselves as emperors, though from what she'd heard, Aro came from a stilt house in an Iron Age village on the muddy bank of a river north of here. He'd seen his Villanovan culture replaced by that of the Etruscans long before Romulus and Remus were supposed to have founded a great city on the mythical seven hills that would be Rome.

She looked past his shoulder at Caius, still seated on a throne, slouched and sullen, just as she remembered him. He had the lithe body of a youth dressed in grown men's robes, but nothing about him signified innocence.

"I'd like to speak with Caius," she said.

"Of course." Aro held out his hand as though to take her elbow.

"Touch me, and Sulpicia will find herself a widow."

"My only intent was to escort you to him," Aro said.

"I'd prefer to speak to Caius alone."

"Anything you need to say to –"

"Alone," she repeated, and she didn't need to force her animosity. She knew he could feel it as fear in his bones.

That ridiculous grin of his faded at last, and Aro turned to Marcus, who had to be roused from what looked, despite the impossibility of it, like heavy sleep. She knew why he stumbled, lifeless and bitter after Aro; his mate had been murdered, purportedly by Aro himself, though she doubted Marcus was aware of that fact. Then again, who else but Aro would kill a sister whose talent was to make everyone blissfully happy? Most had apparently craved her presence like a drug. Bella wished she could have met the woman whose effect on those around her had been the opposite of her own.

Finally Aro touched hands with Caius and withdrew from the room.

The blonde Volturi could have been Ginnie's brother; both were fair and restless, but unlike Ginnie, he could hold his face rigid with disinterest through most anything if it would hide his motives. No matter. His motives almost always had something to do with brutality. It made him predictable.

"Where is Edward?" Bella asked.

"Who?" He sat up in his throne and straightened his robes.

"The newborn taken from my home. Taken four days after I told Demetri that I wasn't coming to India."

"The boy no one else could take care of in your absence? Has he left your care?"

"He's been taken. I was under the impression you might have had something to do with it."

"Perhaps it was Enkidu."

"Or perhaps it was you."

"You think I took him to gain your help." He shook his head. "I'm not a fool. I'd rather have you on our side than angry. You're the only one Enkidu will heed, and I'm still hoping you'll agree to intervene."

"It's been a very long time since I could convince Enkidu of anything."

"But you're important to him. More important than you care to admit, I'd wager, and you did come looking for him not so long ago."

"I have no desire to see him dead, which is where you and I part ways," Bella said. "He wasn't good to me, but I exist because he decided I should live."

Caius tightened his hold on the arm of his throne. "He's out of control now, and he's stronger."

"Stronger in what way?"

"He's not just shielding; now he can reflect damage back on his attacker. Jane managed to come across him, and he brought her to her knees."

"She's dead?" Bella reflected that it wouldn't be an entirely unwelcome piece of news.

"He didn't kill her. Perhaps he let her live so that she could tell us how powerful he's become. And now he has a small army of werewolves."

"A dozen is hardly an army."

"It is when they're werewolves."

"That's your problem. I came for Edward. If you don't have him here, then I'm taking Demetri with me."

Caius sneered then, unwilling or unable to hold it back. "Werewolves are a problem for all of us. If this gets out of hand –"

Before he could finish, Chelsea cleared her throat from the far door and waited for someone to acknowledge her.

"What is it?" Caius asked.

"It's just – I'm sorry to intrude, but there is a woman downstairs who says she's with Isabella."

"Bring her," Bella said.

Chelsea looked to Caius, and at his nod she turned and left.

Bella moved closer until she was leaning directly over Caius. "Keep wasting my time with your troubles. I can guarantee you it will be more unpleasant for you than for me."

He couldn't hide the shudder that passed through him, but he held himself together even as he slid from the chair and took a step back to put the throne between himself and her.

"Perhaps if I had more information about Edward's disappearance, I could be of some help to you," he said.

There was the smallest possibility that Caius wasn't involved, so she told him what had happened, leaving out the scent in the woods that may or may not have belonged to a werewolf.

Ginnie had just been ushered into the room, and she came to Bella's side, trembling and giving her an odd, frustrated look that was probably meant to convey something, though Bella had no idea what.

"Do you know where Edward is?" Bella asked Caius, pressing the advantage of having Ginnie at her side.

"I've already indicated that I don't."

Unfortunately that statement in itself was true, and Ginnie's literal gift would probably read it as truth, regardless of what Caius knew. She wondered if the Volturi were aware of Ginnie's talent. Given Aro's obsession with collecting powerful guards, and Ginnie's inability to stay out of trouble, it was entirely possible.

"Did you send someone to take him?" Bella asked.

"I gave no such order." He looked at Ginnie when he answered, as if daring her to comment.

Aro could have given the order, or perhaps Demetri had been told to secure Bella's help however he thought best. She could have pressed the issue, but every moment she wasted here was keeping her from Edward. The very thought of his name made her angrier, and she felt Ginnie move away.

"I'm leaving with Demetri," Bella said. She turned toward the door. "Send him down."

"I'm not sure we can spare him while –"

"I'll return him when I have Edward." Bella headed for the hallway and heard Ginnie follow. "If I find out that you took him, I'll be back," she called.

Caius didn't answer, but she hadn't waited for a reply.

She swept through the lobby and out the door. The rain had stopped, and instead of going to the car, she waited by the fortress for Demetri to appear. Ginnie was still visibly upset, and Bella gave her some space, concentrating instead on the feel of the small stones beneath her boots. It felt strange to wear shoes all the time; she missed the close connection with the earth, but she must have calmed enough that Ginnie could relax a little, because after a while, she stopped shaking.

"What made you change your mind about coming in?" Bella asked her.

"Nothing." Ginnie flinched, as though offended by her own lie, and then she sighed. "I called my grandfather to check in. No one's called or come by the cabin. Anyway, I might have mentioned that I was waiting for you in the car, and he made me an offer, something I want in exchange for staying by your side until you have Edward back."

"That must have been quite an offer."

"It was." She looked away. "Why does he still owe you so much anyway? There must be more to it than you getting me out of Santa Fe."

"There's nothing more."

"But you didn't even– Oh never mind. He already paid you back for keeping me alive."

"If you believe that, then you don't know what you're worth. For me, it was a just a favor, over and settled, but to Bat, it's a debt that never ends. Nothing he can do for me will come close to the value he places on your life."

"You take advantage of that."

"If I took advantage, you'd know it," Bella said, her temper flaring for only a moment, but Ginnie let out a hiss and dropped into a defensive crouch. It was so far from the modern, civilized persona she worked to cultivate, that for a moment Bella was startled. She took a deep breath and let go of everything that wasn't the feel of wind and damp.

"Your grandfather's pride would be offended if I didn't let him help me. You know it, and I know it. Let's leave it at that."

The door swung open, and Demetri stepped out with a leather bag in his hand. He looked surprised and uncomfortable, and Bella couldn't bring herself to care.

"You remember Edward," she told him. "Where are we going?"

Demetri had gone quite still, though his eyes looked to Ginnie and back to Bella several times. He had gloves on and robes with the collar buttoned up to his chin. Maybe he drew some self confidence from looking official. Ginnie, in her heels, her jean skirt and a wraparound blouse, was looking him up and down like he was a museum piece.

"Caius has asked me to be sure that you understand–"

"I don't care what Caius said," Bella told him.

Demetri brought himself to his full height and opened his mouth as if to argue, but she wasn't going to give him the opportunity.

"You're a tracker," she said. "So track. I'd like to have my newborn back within a day."

"He's somewhere to the southeast. A long way off. I can't be specific until we get closer, but I think he's far enough that we should take a plane."

Bella looked over to Ginnie, who dipped her head in a barely discernible nod. It was true then. She let her breath move in and out and matched the pace to the sound of the wind moving through nearby trees. She was not going to give away the depth of her relief that Demetri could sense him at all. If Edward could be tracked, then he was alive, somewhere a long way off, but alive and waiting for her to come. _I'm on my way now. It won't be long, Edward._

"Where are we flying?" Ginnie asked.

Demetri had the good sense not to meet Bella's eyes. "I don't know exactly," he said. "Maybe he's in Asia. I can tell it's a long distance. We should head to China, India or Pakistan to start, and once there I'll be able to tell you more."

"I think we both know where we're going," Bella said.

"I really won't know for sure until we're closer to the newborn." He looked back toward the castle. "I already had your entrance visa for India prepared from before, but I'll need to get a visa for your companion. If you'd like to wait inside, it shouldn't be long. We have someone on site who handles it."

"We'll wait in the yellow car west of here," Bella said.

Ginnie followed her back, and for a long time the two of them sat unmoving in the front seat. Though Bella started to grow impatient, she worked to keep her self control so that Ginnie would relax enough to focus on the drive to the airport. The blonde was drumming her fingernails on the wheel.

"What did your grandfather offer you that was enough to overcome your fear of the Volturi?" Bella asked.

Ginnie smiled for the first time since they'd left the cabin. "He told me if I did this, he would never ask me to go anywhere near you again."

"A good trade then," Bella said, once again reminded of why she'd retired to the woods in the first place.

Through the window she could see Demetri plodding toward the car as though he were a condemned man heading for the axe. He managed to fold himself into the tiny back seat, and Ginnie navigated through the narrow streets to the highway. Bella just stared out the window at a river overflowing its banks and the dark clouds rolling out with the wind.

 _Closer now, Edward,_ she thought. He couldn't hear her, but the words were for her own comfort anyway.


	14. Freedom / Responsibility

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's a short, non-descriptive reference to cutting in this chapter.

Bella could remember crying at least once during her incredibly short human life, and she knew that when the tears were gone, there had been a moment when a weight seemed to lift and exhausted relief followed. The trouble with memory was that she couldn't recreate the feeling. There were few reasons to envy humans, but that ability to release emotion was one of them. Despite the long moments when she shut out all thought, a caustic sense of her own helplessness kept eating away a hole in the middle of her chest.

If the Volturi had taken Edward, then they knew she was getting close, and they might decide to destroy the evidence. Even if someone else had taken him, the fact remained that until he was back in her – her _what_? 'Her possession' sounded wrong. He wasn't hers, though he was her responsibility. Until he was back in her company, he was at the mercy of whoever held him hostage. They could be burning him right now.

She wondered whether this feeling inside her was anything like the fear she inflicted on others.

At least there had been good news when they arrived at the airport in Mumbai at dawn. Demetri confirmed that Edward was only about three hundred miles away.

"To the south, and not on the move," he said. "Easier for us if he continues to stay still."

Demetri looked surprised that they needed to head in the direction of Anshi Park, the vast wildlife reserve where Enkidu had recently been seen. When he'd vowed that he'd had no hand in the kidnapping, Ginnie had mouthed, "Yeah, he's clean," which Bella took to mean that Demetri was telling the truth. Of course, it was entirely possible that Alec or Afton had been sent to her cabin to do the dirty work, but at the moment she was willing to forgo questions, as long as the tracker continued to get her closer to Edward.

Unfortunately, the weather slowed them down. Mumbai was hot and sunny, and they were forced to go to ground until nightfall. If Bella shared one thing in common with the Volturi, it was the conviction that vampires were better off going unnoticed. Neither she nor Ginnie wanted to travel through the crowded city while light bounced off their diamond skins, and Demetri would rather have cut off his own head while his body felt around for a box of matches and some lighter fluid. Though they had only been travelling together for the better part of a day, it was clear that he was fanatical about the rules.

"Oh, you're a Virgo all right," Ginnie had told him when they'd settled into a hotel suite and he'd clucked at her for disabling the smoke alarms. "I bet you drive the speed limit too." She pulled out the pack of cigarettes she'd bought in the airport.

It was the first time Bella had seen her smoke, and she wondered if she were doing it just to make the tracker twitch. He and Ginnie had been sparring since Volterra: about her shopping from a catalog on the airplane, about his unwillingness to dress like a regular person, about whose elbow would win the jostling contest for the arm rest that lay between them…

At least they had space to spread out here. The rooms they'd been given – two bedrooms and a sitting room – were larger than Bella's cabin. Instead of giving her a sense of modern India, they were surprisingly like the beige and gold décor in Volterra. "It's the Grand Hyatt," Ginnie had explained as she nodded her approval. Demetri had paid without being asked, and Bella had let him. Currency had never seemed as real to her as trading in actual goods, and besides, the Volturi could afford it.

Ginnie fell back on a sofa with her legs tucked under her. She was reading another magazine and had turned on a screen that was very like the movies they'd seen on the airplane. Women in saris were dancing to music that sounded like nothing Bella had ever heard on a radio. The song was loud and filled the room. Perhaps Ginnie was as addicted to continuous noise as the humans seemed to be.

Demetri returned from the hall. He'd walked far enough away that they couldn't hear his whispered phone conversation, but now that he was back and seated stiffly in an armchair, Bella wasn't going to let him get away with secrecy.

"Who were you talking to?" she asked.

He looked at Ginnie for a long moment before he answered. "Aro."

"And what did he tell you?"

"Caius has only instructed me to find the newborn. I don't think he intended for me to tell you every – "

"What did Aro say?" Bella asked again, and this time her tone of voice caused Ginnie to flinch, though she didn't look up from her magazine.

The lenses Demetri wore had disintegrated, and his eyes were red once again when he looked up. "Aro said… He told me that since I'm this close, that after we find your newborn, he wants me to remain and help the others with the search for Enkidu."

"Why? I thought you couldn't track him," Ginnie said.

"I only end up tracking myself if I try. Even before Enkidu could act as a mirror, I never tracked him; he's immune to me." He gave a wry smile that softened his face. "I can pick up a scent like anyone else though. I'll be as useful as the rest."

"Who else is here searching?" Bella asked.

"I'm not comfortable answering that."

Ginnie's face curved into a cold smirk, most likely because of the absolute truth of his statement.

"Your comfort is not my first priority," Bella said.

"No, I'm sure it isn't. But loyalty to the Volturi is mine."

"Loyalty?" Ginnie's voice was a growl that surprised them both. "You're a glorified hound dog, and if they lose you, they'll just get another tracker."

Demetri sat up a bit straighter. "I'm the best at what I do," he said. "There's never been another who can track someone from the far side of the world. And contrary to your belief, I am valued for more than my skill. Loyalty and honor, though clearly not something you would understand –"

Ginnie was on her feet before he could finish.

"You know fuck-all about honor," she said. "You can't even face a fair fight. You think it's _honorable_ , what you do? You're more delusional than I thought."

She was breathing hard, but she didn't throw off Bella's hand when she felt it on her shoulder.

"Ginnlaug," Bella started.

"He believes this shit, Isabella. That's the worst part. The idiot thinks he's right." She turned to Demetri. "You know what makes me happy? One day you'll all be out on your ass, just like Isabella said. Just like the covens before you."

"You'd rather have the Romanians back?" Demetri asked. "They didn't care who knew what we were. It's only lucky that there were no cameras, no bombs and no internet, just a few angry mobs with torches. You think we should refrain from using our talents so every vampire that gets careless can have a fair chance of taking us down while they let the world see the truth? Grow up. The only reason you live in the relative safety you do is because the Volturi make sure humans think they're comfortably at the top of the food chain."

"I didn't ask for a goddamned thing from the Volturi," Ginnie said. "I live my own life. But you... you're just doing what other people tell you. Tracking down a newborn you know nothing about, just because you were told to."

"And how is that different from you?"

"I owe a debt, you idiot. And after this, I have my own life to return to."

"Oh yes, of course," he said. "From what I've gathered so far, that consists of keeping up with fashion and slang just so you can what? Buy things? Slink around eating animals so you can live among our more natural prey in a rented loft apartment? If that's living your own life, you can keep it."

"I've fought in battles that would make you shake until your knees buckled."

"Then why do you waste your time?" Demetri asked, and his question sounded disturbingly earnest. "Why don't you fight for something?"

"I happen to need… I can't just…" Ginnie stopped to get herself under control. It took a long minute. "My mate died not so long ago." She moved in on Demetri, and he had the good sense to step backward while he processed this turn in the conversation. "Were you in Santa Fe?" she asked.

Bella stepped back. Ginnie's sudden temper, her unwillingness to leave New Mexico that night, the fact that Bella had been forced to use her ability to frighten the blonde into submission – it all made sense.

"What?" Demetri looked completely thrown.

"Were you at the massacre in Santa Fe? 1862," she said. "It's a simple question."

"Aro had no need for a tracker."

"That's not an answer."

"I wasn't there."

Ginnie relaxed almost imperceptibly. "Nikolai was Russian too," she said as though it were an accusation, but she sat back down on the sofa.

No one said anything. Demetri darted his eyes to Bella. Perhaps he hoped she'd know what to do about Ginnie's emotional non sequitur, but Bella decided it was time to retreat to the next room with the door pushed closed so she could get her head around what had just happened.

The bedroom smelled of sanitizer and smoke and plastic and human sex, but as long as she focused on the breath moving in and out, she could handle the thought that she'd forced Ginnie to leave her mate behind to die _. I didn't even know her mate was there_ , _so how can I be at fault?_ But that thought didn't lift her spirits. She knew others felt that the mating bond was almost sacred.

Long ago, Enkidu had tried to convince Bella that she was his mate. For the first hundred years she had almost believed it, because he'd given her life when she thought she would die and because, even though he hardly ever smiled, he didn't leave her behind. He liked to climb mountains until the air was so thin only a vampire could live. He liked to cut himself in patterns and watch the skin seal over again. He liked the thrill of sickening fear he felt around Bella. But more than anything else, he liked the way humans left offering bowls for him, cowed by terror and awe, and it was that obsession with being worshipped that finally proved to Bella that when Enkidu whispered against her temple, "You are my one true other half," he hadn't meant it. She would never be enough for him.

 _Enough._ This sort of thinking was not going to still her mind. She was too close now to lose focus. People were depending on her. Carlisle trusted her with Edward's life; Bat believed she'd return with his granddaughter unharmed. Bella wasn't sure she could do any of those things unless she could get some slim hold on the part of herself that moved through the world as though it couldn't touch her. She let her mind empty again until she was almost floating, and after a while the room grew darker. Then she pulled the door open to tell her traveling companions that it was time to go. She was surprised they hadn't come for her yet, but when she moved farther into the living room, she understood why.

At first she thought that Ginnie was injured. Her pale, thin legs were visible above the back of the sofa, and the moan deep in the back of her throat was almost a feral sound, far beyond reason or self control. _What had Demetri done to her?_ But as she moved closer and saw the muscles pulling across his shoulder blades, she cursed herself for an idiot. Though she was still completely in the dark about how they had gone from shouting to this naked display, there was no doubt at all about what was happening in front of her.

She had the strangest desire to curse them or douse them with a water hose, but she found herself frozen. It wasn't often that anything embarrassed her. She had no idea why she should be upset, but the tension she felt was going to leech out and set the tracker and Ginnie on edge. She took a few steps back. Was nothing going to comply with her wish to have herself under control? Was it so much to ask that she remain calm until she'd snatched Edward back and made her way across the ocean, back to the trees and the river and her small cabin? It didn't seem like a lot to need, but apparently it was, because Demetri jumped up, naked and still obviously aroused, and began stuttering, "She… I…," and Ginnie was lying back with her delicate blouse wrapped around her neck like a scarf, looking resentful and, yes, probably more than a little afraid of her.

"You have the worst fucking timing in the world. Again. I swear to all the gods," Ginnie said.

"It's dark," Bella said. "It's dark now, so you…"

She looked at Demetri, who was still sputtering "I didn't…" and "We only…" while clutching a cushion in front of himself and reaching for his robe with his other hand.

"I'm going to need a minute," he said.

Bella was having none of it. "You stop sniveling. Get dressed, because we're leaving." Then she grabbed her backpack and went to wait for them downstairs by the marble fountain.

 _Listen to the water pouring into the pool. Breathe, breathe... and why the hell am I angry?_ Bella didn't understand herself. Even the nearby humans were looking a little concerned for their safety, though they probably couldn't trace the feeling to her. For a moment she wanted to climb into the fountain and lie under the water. Instead, she imagined it, what it would be like to be completely alone right now, and the feeling calmed her a little, and that would have to do, because she needed her companions to focus now that it was dark and they could get her closer to Edward.

 _Edward._ Oddly she found that just thinking his name made something settle back into place. Demetri and Ginnie were coming through the door, and she could make herself not terrify them. She rolled her head from side to side and let her shoulders fall. _Alright._

"I've already had a car sent," Demetri said, as though he wanted to placate her with his efficiency. "The valet is bringing it around now."

"A man-servant?" Bella asked. When had he had time to get a valet?

Ginnie rolled her eyes. "That's not what it means any more. It's the guy who parks for you." She pushed past them both and waited at the curb until a grey car was brought around. Demetri waved his hand toward it and followed Bella and finally, finally, they were on the move again.

The drive was an exercise in calm in the face of ridiculous tension. At least Ginnie and Demetri seemed to know why they were tense. Ginnie kept glancing at Bella while Demetri resolutely refused to look at either of them. Ginnie drove them through the night and into the day, and anyone who passed them probably wondered at the blinding, opalescent light shining in their car, but it wasn't as though the truth would occur to them. Demetri had looked distinctly uncomfortable, but there were almost no cars on the small back roads into the jungle, and Bella refused to pull over until they'd gotten so far past the last tea plantations that the rolling hills were empty and dark with evening shadows, and the road became so impassable that it would be faster for them to travel on foot.

Anshi Park had been left wild and untouched. The air was damp with rain that hadn't fallen yet, and after only a few steps, they disappeared into a world that was slick and smelled like moss and oxygen. Like everything, it changed over time in its own inexorable way, but it looked like a relentless green mass of life that had been here since before there were people.

They cut swift paths through the trees. The undergrowth was much denser than in Appalachia, and the insects that swarmed them looked like silver netting when the moonlight would get a sliver of light down through the canopy.

Bella and Ginnie had left their shoes in the car. Demetri's soaked cloak snagged on branches so often that he'd removed it, leaving it folded across a low hanging vine, and now he slipped silently ahead in black slacks and a black dress shirt. Though still overdressed, at least he wasn't falling behind any more.

"Close to the full moon," he called back. "Our timing could've been better."

"Our timing will be fine if you do your job," Bella said.

He was quick when he wanted to be, and Bella picked up the pace to keep him in her line of sight. She could follow him by smell or bring him down, if she had to, the same way she'd floored Edward when he'd caught the scent of human blood, but she was hoping it wouldn't come to that. Every once in a while she'd call to ask if they were still headed toward Edward. Demetri would shout back, "Yes," each time without a hint of irritation, and she no longer doubted that he knew Ginnie would catch him in a lie.

"He wasn't in Santa Fe, you know," Ginnie said, as though answering some question Bella hadn't asked.

"What?"

"No matter what you think of me, I would never have touched him if he'd been there when Nikolai died." She kept her voice low enough that Demetri wouldn't hear.

"I never said… Look, I don't need an explanation," Bella told her. "As long as you do what you came here to – "

"Is that why you're so upset? You think I've gone soft on a Volturi, because _what_ , I wanted a little release? Because he almost made me come before you crashed the party? Well, fuck you. Some of us like to get laid once in a while. Some of us know what to do with a willing cock and aren't too prissy to take what we can get."

"You're angry," Bella said. She reached an arm out as though to an untamed creature, but then thought better of it.

"Damn right. But you were angry first, and it's had your tracker and me jumping out of our skins ever since you found us going at it. You don't know what it's like for the rest of us when you get mad… and why are you mad anyway? What's it to you as long as I keep my promises?"

"Nothing, it's none of my business," Bella said.

"No, it isn't. I can feel how upset you are though. Why do you think the tracker's keeping so far in front of us? It's you," Ginnie said. "Ok, maybe it's me too; honestly I don't think he's all that used to getting laid. But you are making my skin fucking crawl with this feeling that you're about to kill us all, so if you could just, I don't know, tone that down…"

"I'm trying," Bell said. She thought about telling Ginnie to drop back for a while, but she wasn't sure that would help. "I don't know why it bothered me. I do worry about you letting your guard down with a Volturi when we're so close to finding Edward. We can't trust him. You don't even like Demetri."

"I don't have to like him. Not everyone has their mate. You of all people should know about that. Does that mean I never get to touch anyone again?"

"So you're just using him?" Bella asked. She thought about Edward bending her body in the river and his mouth moving along her jaw and pressing into her neck, the way his hand felt against her shoulder and how it trailed down her spine. Then she felt hot and angry all over again, and now she knew why.

"I can't deal with you," Ginnie said. Her voice was tight and strangled. "I have to get…" She didn't bother to finish, just ran after Demetri as fast as she could go with palm fronds slapping against her, and then she too was almost out of sight.

Bella let her leave. The thought that Edward had been filling his time with her only because there was nothing else in the woods to occupy him… She felt a tingling on her skin and she heard Ginnie curse as she and Demetri tumbled to the ground. She had to calm down or she was going to completely incapacitate them. She slowed to a stop so she wouldn't get too close, and she forced in slow, even breaths for several minutes.

Getting Edward back was all that mattered. Getting him back unharmed and keeping him safe. She could do that. She only had to focus on each step. Calm down now so that Demetri could function. After that there would be running, then catching Edward's scent, then killing his captor, then putting her hands on the newborn, then home. Surely it would be easy, when it was all straight forward like that.

She looked up and saw Ginnie dragging herself to her feet.

"Demetri took off. He's found something," Ginnie called. "Can you smell that?"

Bella breathed in, longing for Edward's sandalwood and cardamom but getting a lungful of sour and bitter instead. It prickled at her nose, burning like the memory of the kidnapping, and with a growl she was in the air, pushing off from the trunks of trees and charging toward the scent.


	15. Capture / Rescue

_The earth mother fashioned clay and threw it into the wilderness and created Enkidu,_  
born of silence, endowed with strength. He knew neither clan nor settled living.  
He ran with the animals and jostled at the watering hole,  
but unlike the animals, Enkidu's thirst was not slaked by mere water.*

_\- from the Epic of Gilgamesh, Tablet I. Bronze Age, 2700 BC_

The scent saturated the air and twisted through the trees. Pursuit should have been easy, but with the smell all around - prickling Bella's nose, burning like ammonia - it was impossible to know which direction to take. She had to trust in Demetri. He was a blur up ahead, either moving toward Edward or attempting to escape. If she let him gain any more distance, she'd lose the power to bring him down with fear, but he was still tracking, she hoped, and she couldn't afford to stop him now if Edward was close.

Flat palm leaves smacked against her skin, one after the other in a stuttering rush of sound, but underneath that she heard unfamiliar voices. They weren't alone.

"Ginnie, keep up," she called, because it would be easier to protect the blonde if she stayed close. There was only a huff of air in reply and the faster footfall behind her as Ginnie picked up the pace.

Beneath the voices, beneath the slap of leaves and the beat of their own feet, there was something else. Bella let her world narrow down to reflex and sound as she avoided a fallen log and opened herself to listening. There, quieter than the rest, the steady pulse of blood - a heart pumping. _No_ , several hearts, almost in a circle around her, and getting closer.

What creatures had beating hearts and yet didn't have the instinct to keep their distance from blood drinkers?

Given what she knew about the acrid smell and given where they were, it was werewolves, most likely. The voices she could make out were human, and she glanced up to see a waxing moon – not quite full – through a break in the canopy. _Not turned, then_. From what she'd heard they were strong in their human form, and though not nearly as deadly without claws and a massive set of teeth, tonight they still had the advantage of self control and reason. She almost wished they were wolves. Better to battle brute force than cunning…if there was to be a battle. Normally there'd be no doubt, but if these creatures were really following Enkidu's orders….

It was hard to imagine werewolves living alongside a vampire, following him, if the Volturi were to be believed. She'd never seen such a thing, but her life was hardly an instant compared with that of her maker. Enkidu had been alive when the first wolf cub was taken in by man and learned to be a part of a human pack. He'd even told her of the last of the old ones – the great, sturdy Neanderthals who'd hunted mammoths in smaller and smaller numbers until the last of them were gone.

Now, over three thousand years since she'd left him, Enkidu was quite possibly very near. She didn't feel the confusing rush of revulsion and gratitude that usually accompanied thoughts of him. At the moment, his werewolves stood between her and Edward. It could be a coincidence… or not. Either way, despite having looked for her maker every thousand years or so, she had no desire to let him slow her down now. It was startling that the most powerful bond she'd ever known meant next to nothing in the face of finding Edward.

She kept her eyes on Demetri as she followed his every turn, but she almost stumbled when she saw him skid to a halt to avoid running into two men and a woman with a thick scar across her jaw. Though lean and heavily muscled, they looked human, but their heartbeats were faster, and the smell was overwhelming now.

Bella slowed her pace, and Ginnie collided with her back as they made their way up to Demetri and the strangers who'd halted his progress. One of the men looked Indian, but the other two were European.

Demetri turned to Bella as she drew close. He was looking to her to make the next move, and it didn't surprise her. He was the sort who could be stoic enough to carry out any order, however distasteful, but he was not a leader. Even the strangers sensed it, because they turned to her as well.

"We're looking for someone. A young vampire," she said. "What do you want?"

_There, that should get them straight to the point._

"You feel different," the tallest man said. He had thick brown hair that hung in waves to his shoulders. His eyes were bright blue.

"She's dangerous." This judgment came from the woman half behind him who looked like she could have been his sister. "She makes my skin crawl. I don't think Kurtz will like her."

"You will stop what you're doing," the man told Bella. Clearly he was the leader, at least in this little group, and Bella turned all her attention to him, even as the other man whispered something she didn't recognize in Hindi.

"We have stopped, haven't we? We're not running," Ginnie said.

Leave it to Ginnie to brazen out a fight when they were outnumbered. Bella gave her a hard look, and Ginnie drew in a breath of frustration, but closed her mouth and turned away.

"I make people feel unsettled." Bella said. "I can't stop it any more than I already have. It's in my nature."

The leader gave a short nod, and held up his hand so no one would speak. After a moment of thought, he turned his bright eyes on Bella again.

"We've been told about a woman who brings fear wherever she goes. Are you Dae?" he asked. He drew the name out softly, _Day-ee_ , as though it were sacred.

It was the confirmation of everything the Volturi had told her. This man knew her original name, her human name, and the only way that would be true was for Enkidu to have spoken of her, though she didn't want to imagine why, after so many years apart, he would speak her name aloud. She wondered whether to lie, but she suspected that either way they would bring her to Enkidu, and though the three werewolves had heartbeats that made them sound vulnerable, she could hear more voices, others that were waiting, hidden in the trees, for one word from this blue eyed man. His shoulders were set, and he was ready for any sign of aggression, and though Ginnie was the only natural discerner of lies, Bella had an intuition that she didn't want to lie to this man.

"I'm Dae," she said.

"This way then," and he turned and walked deeper into the forest without looking back. "We will take you to Kurtz."

The scarred woman hesitated and then hurried to catch up with her leader. Voices moved in closer behind them, now loud and unconcerned, and Bella guessed there were about seven or eight werewolves nearby, though there were still only three in sight.

Ginnie said, "What now?" but Bella ignored her and concentrated on the meeting ahead. The werewolves they followed had sensed her talent so they weren't immune, or at least, not in their human state. That was the first thing to note. She suspected Ginnie's gift would be useful as well. Enkidu was immune mainly to talents that required will and a focus on him specifically – Demetri trying to track him, Jane trying to torture him. He had never been immune to Bella, and like Bella, Ginnie's talent was innate, continuous and applied to everyone around her whether she concentrated or not. It occurred to Bella that Edward's mind reading was much the same, and for a moment she felt a sharp ache of longing that had nothing to do with whatever help he could have offered if he were here.

"Are we still moving closer?" she asked Demetri.

"Closer?"

"To Edward." She gave in to the impulse to jab her elbow into his ribs, and realized that without the heavy robe he felt thinner than she'd expected.

Demetri paused and cocked his head to the side. "He's a little to the north of where they're leading us, and perhaps thirty miles away."

"So close."

"Close to Enkidu," he agreed. "You can't believe that's merely a coincidence." He shifted his hand to rub gingerly at his ribs until he noticed her watching. "What is it about the newborn anyway? Is it affection, or does he have some talent you find useful?"

The werewolves hadn't once turned to see that she was following, but their senses were probably as attuned as hers, and scent and sound would be letting them know exactly where she was. She lowered her voice. "You will not speak of him while we're among strangers." She kept her head down, but lifted her eyes to let Demetri see the anger there.

"Of course. My apologies, Isabella."

There was smoke and the ashy smell of coals in the air now, and she could see orange sparks spitting into the night. More hearts, more voices, and then she caught the scent like tilled earth and salted driftwood that she hadn't breathed in for over three thousand years. Enkidu. She felt her chest pull tight with short breaths, and forced herself to calm down.

Their guides, captors – whatever the werewolves were – pushed aside the last palm fronds that had blocked her view of a clearing where even the undergrowth was swept away. Though she'd caught the scent of it, the bonfire in the middle was still a surprise; perhaps Enkidu wasn't bothering to hide himself from the Volturi at all. He sat on the far side of the fire in a wooden chair that looked like a heap of sticks lashed together. It was raised off the ground on a crude platform several feet high so that, even seated, he was above them all.

Four werewolves, all female and three of them Indian, were seated at his feet, two on either side of him. The ones who had brought her here – there were seven of them, six of them male – moved past the fire and knelt on the ground. When she didn't kneel, the blue eyed man started to get to his feet, but Enkidu waved a hand dismissively, and the lead werewolf settled back on his heels and said, "My Lord Kurtz, we brought the woman who tests us with fear. May our efforts please you." His reverent tone was such a flashback to the early days that for a moment Bella felt like she was in her youth again, accepting earthenware bowls of blood from trembling human hands as she watched the pulse thrum in the back of their necks. It brought forward such a wave of disgust and impatience that she felt it ripple out as tension gripping everyone around her until it reached the farthest side of the clearing and fear wrapped itself around Enkidu.

He smiled then, a rare and unsettling event.

"Come forward," he said, either to her or to all three of them, but Ginnie and Demetri stayed in place as Bella made her way through the kneeling werewolves. When she jumped up onto the dais, there was an anxious murmur behind her, probably because she now stood taller than their master in his chair. Enkidu held out a hand to silence them and stood so that they were face to face.

"Dae," he said. "I have missed you."

At slightly under six feet, he was miraculously tall given the time when he'd been born, but he did have the strong features that marked him as being from another age. He was spare and muscled and utilitarian – handsome in a stark way, with black hair that fell across his pale skin and threatened to hide red eyes. He raised a jeweled hand as if to touch her shoulder – his fingers weighted with a heavy signet ring and several copper bands – and leaned toward her. He didn't like to be touched, and contact had been such a ritualized and often painful event between them that she wasn't surprised when his hand pulled back, and he let it fall back to his side.

"Enkidu." She nodded once.

"I'm Kurtz now."

"I go by Isabella."

"No, you're still Dae. Even the birds here know it. They've flown off, and the woods went quiet in your wake. I know you." He gestured to her neck. "You still wear the blood pendant I gave you the night you died. You're still Dae."

"I'm not." She ran her fingers over the worn bronze dagger on a chain. "I wear it to remember what I once was." _What I never want to be again_ , she almost said, but it wouldn't be wise to antagonize him. She was nothing like she'd been when she'd trusted this man. She held Enkidu's gaze and kept her emotions in check, knowing that, up to a certain point at least, he would see her ability to cause fear as a weakness. He knew that a lack of control could make it to spike around her unintentionally.

"Are we arguing already?" he asked. "Just when you've been flushed out of hiding?"

"I haven't been hiding. In fact, I have looked for you," she said, hoping the words would flatter and subdue him. "I was afraid you might be dead."

"I am dead."

"As in, no longer walking the earth," she said. "I heard you were in Herculaneum when Vesuvius erupted. I thought you might not have made it out."

"You know that the only way I could have succumbed would be by my own choice. The air there was heavy, but of course I had no need to breathe it, and I avoided lava flows. Did you think I didn't want to live anymore?" He laughed, and it was a hollow sound. "You've never understood me. You should have seen the eruption though, the bodies of men, of children and horses and dogs tied to posts, twisted in houses and on the streets, all blanketed in ash within hours. I wasn't bored."

Bella wanted to shout, _I don't have time for this. I need to find Edward_ , but she couldn't risk it without knowing whether he was involved in the kidnapping.

"Do you know why I'm here?" she asked instead.

"Look at you. Your eyes are a travesty. You've been abstaining. There was a time when you were so sated on human blood that you couldn't even make the last few kills; do you remember?"

"Stop." She took a deep breath and tried to keep herself controlled enough to not give in to the outburst of fear he wanted to provoke. Though she could fill the clearing with it, Enkidu might enjoy that, and in retaliation, he could suck the life and joy out of anything, and it wasn't a talent – just the way he was.

"It was a mistake for you to leave me," he said. "I was angry enough to let you go at the time, but now I have need of you."

"He means that," Ginnie whispered from behind her.

The sun was coming up, and Bella heard rain a long way off, the first drops tapping the distant canopy to the north where Edward was waiting somewhere.

How to maneuver her way out of this, she wondered. Flattery would work on Enkidu only to a certain point. Though he drank it down, he never believed a word of it, and after a while, the praise would start to rankle, making him angry. But flat rejection would humiliate him in front of witnesses, and that too would prompt him to lash out. She could use her fear until everyone here was writhing on the ground waiting for her to make the world blink out of existence, but Enkidu knew the truth about her talent, and that knowledge gave him power. Plus she didn't know how the werewolves would react. They could sense the fear obviously; the woman had said Bella made her skin crawl – but would it incapacitate them long enough for her to grab Ginnie and the tracker and escape? It would be dangerous to count on it.

She'd have to exploit the fact that she didn't fall into either of the two categories that Enkidu used to define almost everyone. She wasn't a worshipper, and she wasn't his enemy. She wasn't even his acolyte as she'd once been. If he thought for a moment that she could be reduced to her old status, he would know exactly how to deal with her, but if she could keep him off guard by holding her own against him while not crossing the line that would make her an enemy, she might be able to negotiate an exit.

"What do you need from me?" she asked. "I owe you enough that I've been concerned about your disappearance, but right now I have alliances of my own to uphold. I've made a promise to another to return something that belongs to him. Once I've accomplished that, perhaps I could be of service to you."

She heard Ginnie shifting behind her as she tried to sort out the truth and the lies in Bella's formal words. She was probably hung up on the word 'something' – for Edward was hardly a thing – and the mention of an alliance, for really, what Bella had with Carlisle was simply friendship, but Enkidu would never understand that. Ironically, it was better to speak in dishonest terms he would believe than in truthful ones that would make him think she was lying.

"Come back to me, and you won't need another alliance," he said. "I'm making a move now that will consolidate so much power that the Volturi will become obsolete."

Bella didn't turn to look at Demetri, but she hoped he had the good sense to keep still behind her. Without his robe on, it was probable that no one here knew he was a Volturi guard.

"I made a promise to an ally," she said.

"No, you'll stay."

"I won't. I don't want to pick a fight with you, but I will if I have to," she said, and as Enkidu raised a brow, she held up her hand before he could speak. "I can finish what I've promised to do and then come back to you." She had no intention of returning, certainly not with Edward at her side, but only Ginnie would know that. She kept her head up and her gaze steady so Enkidu would have no reason to doubt her.

"You've left before and didn't come back."

"But you didn't come looking for me either," she said, infusing her voice with a hint of disappointment. When she'd run from him, the possibility that he would hunt her down had been her greatest fear, but now she wanted Enkidu to believe that she regretted their time apart.

"I have your word that you'd return?"

He knew she took a promise far more seriously than he did, but at least he hadn't given her a time frame. "You have my word," she said, knowing that she wouldn't come back to reason with him until after Edward was safe and far from here.

"Go then, but your companions can wait for you here."

She fought hard to keep her agitation down so that he wouldn't sense it. "I need his help," she said, gesturing toward Demetri. "Without him, I won't be able to find what I'm looking for."

"The girl, then."

Bella shook her head. "I've made a promise to protect her."

"You should know better than to make all these promises. I taught you that much. But the girl will be fine here. No harm will come to her."

Bella turned to look, and Ginnie said, "Yes, I'll be fine." She obviously thought Enkidu was telling the truth, but that didn't mean he wouldn't change his mind later if something set off his temper.

"I'll need her as well," Bella said.

"One or the other, but not both."

"I could stay here, Isabella," Demetri said, and he was looking at Ginnie. Perhaps he felt something more for her than Bella had realized.

"No," Ginnie said, "You need him, and I made a promise to my grandfather. I'll stay. But you'd damn well better come back for me." She had her hands on her hips and her chin up, and if Bella hadn't known the Vikings never sent women on raids, she could have imagined a human Ginnlaug being the first to hit the shore and sack a rich monastery. This was the sort of fierce self assurance she'd seen from her when they first met near the battlefield in New Mexico.

"Thank you," Bella said. "I will come back for you."

She'd had to almost drag Demetri along with her, but once they'd run for miles, the sour scent of the werewolves grew faint until it was overpowered by the almost sweet smell of the storm.

"Just up ahead. We'll go back for Ginnie as soon as we have the newborn?" Demetri asked. He held a branch up so that Bella could move past it.

"I'll need to get Edward away from here first." Not only did she need him safely away, but she couldn't send him off with Demetri. The last thing she wanted was to place him in the hands of the Volturi, but she couldn't leave Ginnie for long either.

 _I've almost got Edward._ It wouldn't be the end of her problem, but the thought calmed her nonetheless, and kept her from distracting Demetri. _Almost there._ She almost had him, and then she remembered that Edward should be able to read her mind now.

_Edward, I'm here with the tracker who came to the cabin. We're going to free you._

She caught the scent of a werewolf and for a moment she thought Enkidu had sent one of his followers after them, but whoever it was waited up ahead. Did that mean the wolves had taken Edward?

"There!"

Bella looked where Demetri was pointing at a lone woman. She whipped her head around when she heard Demetri shout and then took off at a run.

"A werewolf. Should we go after her?" Demetri asked.

"Just get me to the newborn," she said, but even as she answered she caught the hint of sandalwood on the wind – sandalwood and stagnant water and rotting flesh and the bright green smell of moss. "Edward!" She pushed past the tracker and almost fell into a deep sinkhole that lay in front of her.

"Here. I'm here." His voice was strained and weak, but it was Edward. She could see him far below, knee deep in brackish water that glimmered with the light reflecting off of him. "Down here. _Please_ ," he called. There were dead bodies floating around him, and when he turned his face up to her his eyes were red and pleading.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *I altered the last line of the translation from The Epic of Gilgimesh to give it the opposite meaning. The original is "as with the animals, his thirst was slaked with mere water."


	16. Lost / Found

She wanted to jump.

It was ridiculous, this urge to throw herself down the steep drop without a thought, as though something was struggling to fly out from beneath her ribs. If she gave in, she'd be trapped down there while Demetri was left above to make decisions. She hadn't come all this way just to put Edward's life in someone else's hands. A breath helped her settle and think. Edward hadn't said anything since, "Please." He'd be reading her thoughts now, though what he'd make of the random image in her head of a trapped bird or of herself freefalling toward him, she had no idea.

_Give me a moment to get you out of there, Edward. Remember not to let the tracker know that you read minds. You must have things that need to be said, and I want to know who did this to you, but now is not the time._

He didn't even nod, which was either a sign that he was being careful around Demetri or evidence that he'd shut down under the stress of captivity.

"What do you want to do?" Demetri asked.

The drop was around fifty feet and so sheer that, had she not seen the ground open up like this in her early centuries, she would've thought a machine had been used to punch a straight cylinder out of earth. There was no way Edward could jump up on his own, which was why someone had put him here of course. She looked around. The tallest trees were perhaps thirty feet high.

"Give me a hand," she said.

Demetri followed her to the closest palm, and together they pulled it from the dirt and tugged to release it from vines and branches, until with a crash they'd thrown it down on its side, Bella up to her elbows in palm fronds and Demetri grasping the roots. She walked backwards, watching over her shoulder for the edge of the pit and feeling for any indication that Demetri would use the tree to push her over the edge.

"Move as far back as you can, Edward," she called.

Dark water rippled out from his knees, and once he was safely out of the way, Bella passed the tree down until she and Demetri were holding the roots and there was nothing left but to drop it straight down so that it hit the bottom near the middle of the sinkhole and then fell back with the length braced against the wall of the pit. She didn't need to tell Edward to climb. Before the tree had stopped shuddering, he was hugging the angled trunk, using his feet to push himself higher. His captor had obviously fed him. If it hadn't been clear from the bluish bodies below, his strength proved it. Once he reached the roots of the upturned tree, he was close enough to jump, and he pulled himself up so that he lay curled on the ground at Bella's feet. _Free._

She leaned down, and he flinched. Well…

She told herself she didn't actually need to put her hands on him; it was only an ache. One that felt hollow and reminded her of the time she went far too long with no blood to sustain her, but it was still just a sensation. Newborns could be wary of touch at the best of times, and Edward might be in shock. Anyway, now was the time for the series of events she'd mapped out for him. The sooner they were on the move the better, because she'd need to get Edward at least one hundred miles from here in order to feel that he was safely hidden away while she returned for Ginnie.

He rolled onto his back and looked up at the night sky, chest heaving as if he needed the air.

"We should go back," Demetri said.

Edward threw an arm over his face.

"Give me a few minutes alone with him," Bella said.

"But we –"

"A few minutes."

Demetri relented and after a brief look at Edward, turned and headed in the direction that the werewolf guard had fled. In only moments he had disappeared into the trees, but she waited a while longer before she dropped onto the spongy moss.

"He's trying to phone Aro," Edward said. "He can't get reception. No one's told him anything, and he's not sure what to do now that you've found me."

His flat monotone was more unsettling than any outburst would have been. She'd half expected his first words to be a surprised _You came_.

"Why would it surprise me? I knew you would come." He let his arm fall to the side and turned his red eyes toward her. They made him look like a stranger, something feral.

"You're different as well," he said.

"How do you mean?"

"You look the same, but your thoughts are much busier."

"I've come a long way from home. And I've been…"

"Worried," he said.

"Yes." She gave in to the need to run her hand down his arm to his wrist, and he didn't pull back this time as she slid her fingers across his muddy palm. "Worried."

He nodded and looked back to the sky, but he closed his hand around hers.

"It was Marcus who gave the order," he said.

She wasn't expecting that, not after spotting the werewolf guard. She'd be paying the Volturi another visit. Marcus did nothing on his own, so Caius was behind this after all, perhaps along with Aro, but with Marcus giving the order, they could truthfully say they didn't do it themselves. They probably knew about Ginnie's gift. Did they know about Edward's?

"I don't think they do. The woman, the werewolf… She was supposed to make you think Enkidu was behind everything. The Volturi hoped you'd try to kill him. But they don't know that I could read her thoughts. Caius broke her down when they captured her. Beatings. Sleep deprivation. She has a son – a troublemaker, fifteen – but still her son. They've got him in Volterra. In the end that's how they got her to turn on Enkidu. There are others still loyal to him though. They're like some religious cult."

She nodded.

"You knew that already." Edward paused a moment and then sat up, his legs still stretched out in front. His jeans were filthy and soaked with a greenish slime. For a moment he just listened to her mind. "Bat's granddaughter is here?"

"She's with Enkidu."

"Unless I've lost it, which is entirely possible, Demetri wants her back in one piece."

"I know. That could prove useful," she said. "Let me help you up." It was time to get moving.

"I'm not going to just run along and…" He shook his head. "Fuck, I don't even need to hunt. Can you believe it? I'm always craving it, but I'm so…"

He covered his face with his free hand, and Bella thought perhaps she should put her arms around him, but then again, he might need the opposite of what her instincts were telling her.

"No, I'm… You can't know how I feel now that you're here," he said, "and not just because I'm out of that cesspit. Just for you to be... I'm sorry, my head's not on straight. There's been this rush from the blood, and they just threw them down alive, and one wasn't killed by the drop, but he was close, everything broken and bloody. I tried… tried to turn him, but I couldn't make myself stop; I couldn't stop… I've been waiting, knowing you were going to be here, but I didn't know when. I thought it would take longer."

"I had help."

"The tracker."

She nodded.

"Caius didn't tell him anything. Demetri thinks Enkidu came after me… some attempt to get you back."

"Enkidu doesn't work that way. He expects me to come back to him because I owe him a debt."

"And what exactly do you owe him?" Edward sounded surprisingly bitter, but perhaps it was a good sign. Whatever numbing shock he'd been feeling seemed to be losing its hold on him.

"My life."

"You think you owe him something, what, for biting you?"

"You may understand one day," she said. Edward rolled his eyes at that, but she pushed on. "Human life was just a moment for me. It seems like nothing in the wake of all the time that's been given to me since."

"But you could have grown old, had a human life."

"I was about to be murdered when Enkidu intervened. Men from our village, men I'd known since birth, had come together and decided, and it wasn't just that my mother had been a woman on her own and a healer. That was bad enough, a sort of dark magic, especially when she failed to save someone, but after she died, when I lived alone, every still birth, every sudden illness, and they would look at me, whisper about me. People have always thought I meant them harm. Enkidu saw the seed of my talent in that. He didn't even know if it would manifest as a gift, but he took a chance on me, so that he could have that kind of power under his control."

"If he did it for himself, why do you owe him anything?"

"Because I hate him," she said, and it wasn't until she heard herself that she knew it was true. "He brought me back to my village when I woke, and since I was a newborn I took more than a little revenge. I hated him for that. When I finally left him, I knew I could never go back, and there's nothing I can do to make him less miserable, because he hates himself more than I ever could, so all I have is… a debt, a preference to not to see him die at the hands of the Volturi if I can help it."

"But if he –"

"We need to move, Edward. We need to get you to a place where the Volturi can't find you, so that I can go back for Ginnie."

"Demetri will know how to find me no matter where I hide."

"But Demetri will be with me."

"So will I," he said.

"Edward."

He pulled his hand back and stood up. "I'm strong. Maybe strong enough to take down a werewolf or two if need be."

"There are eleven of them, plus the woman who ran off, if she isn't long gone."

He ignored her and began to pace back and forth along the edge of the sinkhole. "I can read Enkidu's mind. I'll know his plans as soon as he does."

"If I'm worried about you, I won't be able –"

"You can't make me stay away. I'm not a chore that you scratch off a list."

"I never said –"

"There's no point in arguing, Bella."

Her name was soft on his lips. His hands hung limp by his side, and his once-white shirt was shredded; she could see his collarbone through a tear, and it made him look mortal somehow. Had he shouted at her, she would have insisted, but he was resigned and determined at the same time – remarkably steady for someone who'd just tasted his first hit of human blood. She shivered with an odd conviction that she would never shake this young man, even if they outlived mountains and languages and entire civilizations. Or… a terrible thought… what if he died here, tonight, because of her?

Edward moved closer until she could feel his breath on the top of her head. Slowly, as though she were the one who might run off, he put his hands on her shoulders.

"You of all people should know that you can't control everything. Sticking with you is a risk I'm willing to take, and if it gets me killed, it's not your fault. Carlisle will understand. "

Her fears had nothing to do with facing Carlisle.

"Then what?" he whispered, but she didn't answer because he brushed his thumb across her lips, then kissed her lightly, as if it were a first kiss. She wasn't sure she even wanted to know the answer to his question, not while there was so much still at stake before they reached home and safety. His hands were light, as though he was afraid to put any weight on her. Did he think she could send him away if he didn't want to go?

"You could always use fear," he whispered. "It might work; it has before. But I don't think you will."

He was so close that their noses bumped together when she shook her head.

"I'll tell you a secret," she said.

His eyes blinked closed as he leaned his forehead against hers, but she knew he was listening.

"I've never killed anyone with my ability. I can feel it grow around me, but I don't know how bad it can get if let it go all the way. I keep it under control, and it's debilitating, but then it passes with no harm done. Caius is under the impression that I could kill him outright. When the fear hits, people get these thoughts that I'll destroy them with my mind, but so far, it's never happened."

He kissed her with more force this time, biting on her lower lip, his mouth saying, _I don't care, I don't care whether you're deadly or not._ "Why are you telling me this?"

"Because I may have to use fear, and Enkidu likes it up to a point, likes the thrill, so I'd have to hit him hard. If I can't convince you not to come, you'll feel it too. It might be easier if you know that the voices in your head are wrong."

"The voices in my head are usually wrong," he said.

He was biting a line across her jaw, but she pushed him away.

"This isn't a joke, Edward."

"Oh for fuck's sake." He backed up so far that his feet were arched on the edge of the pit. "I've been stuck down there drinking from broken necks, my only company the thoughts of a hysterical werewolf who was terrified that she was going to get her son killed if she changed and mauled me beyond repair, so I'm damn well sure that this is no joke."

"Alright, okay."

"Jesus."

She waited for him to calm down, though by the look on his face, it wasn't going to happen anytime soon. If he was going to lose his temper like this, there was no way she could take him with her.

"I'll be fine," he said. "It's the tracker you should worry about. He's gotten too far away for me to read him."

"He could be trying his phone again."

"I don't think so. He knows that Jane and Alec are nearby."

She shuddered. Jane she could handle just fine – high strung, easily led – but the idea that Alec could take away the senses was unnerving on an instinctual level. She'd never experienced his 'gift' herself, and this would be the worst possible time to start.

"Was Demetri tracking them?" she asked. "Do you know which way he went?"

"I was a little preoccupied."

"We should try to bring him back. If he finds them, he might swing south and go after Ginnie himself," she said.

"Would that be so bad?"

She just looked at him.

"I'm not excited about meeting up with anyone who works for Caius and Aro," he said, "but if they can –"

"They can't. They'll just get Ginnie killed."

"Are you sure?"

"Enkidu is immune to their gifts. Worse, Caius claims that he's found a way to throw their talents back at them."

Edward looked confused, and she realized that she'd expected him to know everything. He took secrets from so many minds, but apparently no one had thought about this around him.

"So he'll be able to read my mind?" he asked.

"No, what you and I do isn't focused on one person; it happens all around us. It's when someone like Jane or Alec tries to target him specifically that he can turn it against them."

"Alright," he started off toward the east and called back to her over his shoulder. "Let's find Demetri then."

That turned out to be nearly impossible. They could barely catch his scent, and then they lost it at a stream. Edward couldn't pick up on his thoughts. They stopped at a fallen log by the water, while Bella tried unsuccessfully to decide what to do. None of the options were good. This was the sort of trouble she got into when she let her emotional response to Edward make her scattered, messy.

"So, you do have an emotional response, then," he said, and then he was crowding her, backing her up until she sat down ungracefully on the damp bark of the tree. "Because honestly, I can't tell."

"What do you want from me?" Her voice sounded ragged, and she wondered if he was feeling any fear.

He leaned down, his lips soft against the thin skin at her temple, and he brushed back her hair. He moved his kisses closer to her mouth, and she stayed quiet as much as she could, feeling the pressure and heat of him, until he kissed at the corner of her mouth and it made her whimper. How did he do this to her, and so effortlessly?

"I want… Do you…" he said, but who knew what he wanted, because instead of speaking, he dropped down in front of her with his weight on his knees and his face level with hers. He trained his eyes on her face with a look that said he was reaching into her to pull out every thought. She looked down at his hand. She must have taken it in hers at some point.

"Bella," he said. "Why do you let me touch you? Is it only because no one else can?"

She laughed then, barely a breath, to think that she had wondered the same thing about him. She thought of Ginnie and Demetri and how angry they had made her. Then Edward smiled, and for a moment there was nowhere they had to go, nothing to do.

"You thought that I was only…" he said. "And when did you see Demetri naked? Bat's granddaughter..."

"You're not finishing your sentences," she said.

"It's your fault. I didn't need that image."

It started to rain, but the sun was coming up, and there were birds not far away. She hadn't realized that she was calm enough for them to venture so near to her. She shouldn't have been calm, not without hours of meditation to bring her to that state. Calm was good though. Calm would get them through this with everyone alive. She would not let herself think of any other outcome.

"Do we keep looking for Demetri or do we head back?" Edward asked.

"We head for Enkidu's camp, but we wait for tonight. It's the full moon."

"Won't that make it worse?"

"The werewolves are stronger, but unable to reason when they're turned. That leaves us with fewer variables. Just brute strength."

"What if the Volturi try to go in before tonight?"

"Demetri's the only one who will be eager to try, and if they show up, you'll hear them coming. We'll stop them."

He held out his hand. When she took it, he pulled her to her feet so fast that she smacked up against him.

"Sorry," he mumbled, but he put an arm across her back to keep her from moving away. "When this is over, we need to talk about things between us."

"Fine," she said, though she knew that he might not feel the same once they got back to the new world. Already he'd shown her a handful of wildly different emotions, and though he had handled captivity better than expected, he had a good few years before he had real control over himself. It would be better if they waited until then.

"I mean it."

"Yes, ok, Edward, we'll talk."

"And you'll listen to me."

"I always listen. I just don't always agree."

He rolled his eyes, but didn't say anything as they made their way toward Enkidu's camp.


	17. Enkidu

**PART 3**

Bella had no idea, but in the hours since he'd first seen her face, pale against her dark hair and the night sky, Edward had been shredded by gratitude and lust and violence. It was almost a shame she didn't know, because the amount of control it took to not act on his impulses was beyond anything he'd ever asked of himself before. When he'd crawled up to the surface, he'd wanted to drag her jeans down and press his face to her skin so that the blood and decay and the anger went away and there was nothing but the scent of her.

Clearly gratitude and lust had bled into one another.

The violence had an easy target as well. There was a goddamned Volturi guard standing over him. At Bella's side. He wanted to toss Demetri down to spend a few days in the pit. It didn't matter that Demetri knew nothing about his kidnapping. It was enough that his fellow guards had done it – the short Irishman, Corin, with his vivid shock of orange hair, and the slower, heavier Santiago, whose quick temper meant that he'd rearranged Edward's ribs until the ginger had finally pulled him back. They were long gone, but Demetri was right here, right now, and Edward wanted to tear something apart, something that wasn't weak and already dying. Something that would fight back and still lose.

Instead, he lay quietly at Bella's feet until she sent the tracker away, and when she finally touched him, he did not flip her over and press her into the moss and lick up the inside of her thigh.

He was a saint, a pillar of control, and the hell of it was that he couldn't tell her, because if she knew half the things he wanted to do – to her, or to Enkidu and Marcus – she would find a way to lock him up somewhere while she dealt with her maker. He wasn't going to take his eyes off of her now. He'd faced his bloodlust in a sinkhole and lost, but in failing, he learned that it was not his fault; God knew he had tried to save the man who'd made it to the bottom with a pulse. Even as the bloodlust swept away his resolve, he hadn't wanted to kill, so Bella was wrong to think he was too young to know what he did and didn't want. Stuck down there in a stew of corpses, there was only one person he knew would come for him, no matter what. She was his mate, or if she wasn't then he would bend the rules to make it true.

Right now, bending the rules meant playing it cool despite the fact that her scent was all around, and her mind was offering up new secrets, and he owed her his freedom, and she'd accused him of thinking this was all a joke. So far he'd kept the brunt of his emotion from her. It felt like thrashing in a straight jacket, but the payoff for his self control was that he was allowed to be here now, pacing back and forth by her side, downwind of Enkidu's camp.

"What are you doing?" she asked.

"Waiting." He made himself stop wearing a track into the mud. He was barefoot, and after the water that he'd been in before, the mud made his feet feel cleaner. He'd left his shirt back at the edge of the sinkhole, but he resisted the urge to take his jeans off and smear clay all over himself. Assuming he didn't die tonight, he was hoping to take a very long shower in the near future.

"No change at the camp?" she asked.

They'd moved in just close enough for Edward to be able to know what Enkidu was thinking, but hopefully not so close that the wolves could catch their scent.

"The werewolves are chanting something; I don't know the language," he said. "Ginnie's still giving me a headache." The girl had the loudest thoughts of anyone he'd ever met, and they were all over the map: she was scared, creeped out, and generally raving in her head about the things she did to make her grandfather happy. Everyone kept telling Edward _he_ was out of control, but personally, he thought her head was a bit like a pack of hyperactive brats. It was _Lord of the Flies_ in there.

For all her drama, Ginnie's mind was still more hospitable than Enkidu's. His was like an inkwell, as though he were the one in a pit looking up into a dimly lit world. His every thought led to suspicion. He looked around himself and imagined betrayal everywhere. Even the wolves who chanted and bowed at his feet – they were completely devoted, but Enkidu didn't trust them. The fact that he wouldn't rely on anyone was a weakness, and Edward could only hope it would prove useful.

The werewolf leader brought his forehead off the ground and crouched. Though his chant was foreign, some of the thoughts behind it were in English. The man considered Enkidu a 'Dark Savior', and Edward would've given money to be the one to show him how dark a place his supposed savior's head really was. All of the werewolves were rising to their feet in a way so choreographed that it was clear they'd done this before. Enkidu went to the leader first, placed a hand against his shoulder and pressed his head to the side, baring the man's neck. Was he going to…

"He is. He's drinking."

Bella didn't understand. "They have a human?"

"He's drinking from the werewolves, one after the other," Edward said. "Just a little. He's calling it a ceremony of connection, but there's another reason, something Enkidu's smug about, something he's not thinking… Oh. There it is."

"What?" Bella asked. She got in front of him, and he realized that he must have started pacing again, because he had to stop to not run into her.

"It's the werewolf blood that strengthens him. That's how he was able to turn Jane's power back on her." Apparently the blood tasted as sour and bitter as it smelled. Edward had spent days subjected to the stench of the woman who threw his 'meals' down to him. Her scent was sharp as ammonia, and it reminded him of stale cat piss. As sick as it sounded, Enkidu seemed to enjoy the burning taste of their blood. He got some perverse pleasure from the fact that he could make himself drink it. It was convoluted, but now Edward had a small understanding of how it was that Enkidu could feel fear from Bella and not have the instinct to back down.

The chanting had stopped and the moon was rising.

"I thought you said the werewolves were wild creatures in their wolf form."

Bella nodded.

"He doesn't fear them," Edward said. She started to speak, to tell him that Enkidu didn't fear anyone, but he held up a hand. "I mean, he's done this before. They don't attack him."

"Instinct must still tell them that Enkidu is their alpha."

The werewolves' minds were disappearing as though sinking into dark water, first murky, then silent.

"They've turned, I think," he said.

"Let's go then." Bella started off toward the camp, but then stopped so abruptly he almost crashed into the back of her. "I need you to stay in control no matter what happens," she said.

He wrapped a hand around her wrist with perhaps more force than he should have. "I'm not completely without my uses." He couldn't have been more surprised by her reaction to his touch. She wanted to lean into him, lean on him, and then she pulled her hand away as if she'd been burned. He would have been offended by her scowl, but for the first time he could see that what she feared was not so much his weakness but her own.

 _He makes me soft_ , she thought, _and I cannot afford it now._

"One day you might find that you _can_ lean on me," he said.

Her face went blank before she turned away, but he didn't want to make it harder for her to prepare for what lay ahead of them, so he followed her without a word and hoped that his actions would prove his point. He wasn't really afraid of Enkidu, though he probably should have been. Jealousy and resentment had pushed everything else he could have felt for the man aside. Enkidu was possessive of Bella, but in a careless way, as though she belonged to him. It didn't help that Bella felt she owed him for her life.

They were getting close, and the stench of wolves was overwhelming. They'd seen no sign of the Volturi guards, and Edward couldn't say he was sorry. Even if they could have taken down a wolf or two, he'd prefer to do this without their help.

"There," Bella whispered, and Edward got his first look through the trees at Bat's granddaughter, dressed for the city instead of a jungle and sticking as close as she could to a large bonfire, as though it were the least threatening thing in the circle. It probably was.

Bella's mind cleared of anything other than the sound of the fire crackling and the feel of ridged bark beneath her hand. Her breathing slowed to a near stop. He waited, unable to match her concentration, but at least understanding why she needed this. There was her now-familiar focus on her breath moving in and out. A damp vine pressed against her ankle. Air, warm and rank with wolf.

Almost before her mind could give her intentions away, she strode into the circle.

The mismatched group of enormous wolves – and they _were_ wolves now, brown and black and one even larger grey wolf – seemed to have the usual response to being near her, because they growled and moved closer together. Enkidu jerked his forearm out and down with his palm flat, and the snarling subsided.

"Isabella." Her name was almost a sigh on Ginnie's lips. After only a few hours, she'd started to wonder if anyone would return for her, and Edward wanted to smack her for it. Did she not know Bella at all?

"Dae," Enkidu said.

Bella flinched at the use of her oldest name, but when he held out a hand with an ostentatious twist of his wrist that was nothing like the arm movement he used to control the wolves, she stepped closer. Edward moved with her until he was at Ginnie's side. Bella's thoughts were telling him to stay back, and for the moment at least, he was willing to live with it, if only to show her that he could.

"Your errand did not keep you far from me for long," Enkidu said.

Bella's mind had that hard stone quality Edward had felt from her after he'd pushed her up against the wall that first day, but her face was convincingly soft. "My errand is not complete. I must take these two back where they belong."

Enkidu didn't even cast a glance Edward's way when Bella gestured toward him and Ginnie. He'd taken Bella's hand, and his thumb was rubbing a slow circle on her palm. He was so sure of her, and yet his image of Bella was nothing like the woman Edward had come to know. He almost thought of her as a doll to be picked up or cast aside as the mood struck him.

"Surely they can get themselves home without your help. They're not children."

"That one is a newborn," Bella said, throwing out her free arm to point at Edward.

The wolves circled one another, barely held back by the command to be still. Enkidu didn't take his eyes from Bella's face. "Let the Norse woman take care of him."

"It's my responsibility."

"I have need of you here."

"And I've told you… I can't be of service to you until I have fulfilled my oath to another. Let me return them to where they belong, and I will come back to you."

She was lying, but speaking so sincerely that if Edward hadn't had access to her mind he would have been convinced that she meant it. Enkidu believed her completely. He even thought that she longed to be back by his side. It was that strange combination of unreasoning arrogance layered over a deeper voice of self loathing that whispered so constantly that Edward suspected Enkidu no longer even knew he was listening. Despite his conviction that she'd come back, Enkidu wanted her to stay by his side now, and he wanted to impress upon her that the timing would be his choice, not hers. He reached out and ran his knuckles across her chest. This time Edward did growl, though it was bronze and not skin he was touching.

"You still remember the old ways," Enkidu said. "You still carry the pendant." He lifted it from her chest and curled his fingers around it. Then he tugged lightly, forcing Bella to lean forward, and Edward had moved half the distance to her before he realized he was in motion.

"Back. The fuck. Off," he said, and Enkidu was actually startled. It would have been the perfect moment for Bella to strike if that had been her intention, but before Edward could even catch her eye, Enkidu recovered, and for the first time, he looked directly at Edward.

"You're far too young to understand what this represents," Enkidu said, still fingering the dagger. "It's not simply a tool for the ritual offering of blood. It's more revolutionary than anything your age has conjured. An alloy of brittle tin and soft copper worked together to create the first metal blades. It brought man out of the Stone Age. It was reserved for those powerful enough to forge the trade routes that could bring the two opposing metals together, reserved for those with the knowledge of how to work them into bronze. I brought this with me from Nineveh and into the wilderness of Europe where I found Dae's people. She was living in a village of perhaps sixty, fumbling about with wool and thatch and standing stones at the Solstice. Like all the others, they were eager to bow down to knowledge greater than their own. I didn't even bother hunting them. They cut their own skin with knives like this one, offering their blood up to me. And Dae…" he said, turning back to Bella, "Remember what I made you," he told her. "After they almost killed you, you were more than happy to accept your due from humans right along with me."

Finally he paused for the breath it took to form more words, and Edward said, "I know one thing. You like to hear yourself talk."

Again the momentary surprise – _did no one ever tell this man off?_ – and again Bella either failed to see or refused to take advantage of the moment and strike. She was worried about what the wolves would do – eleven against three – if she raised a hand to Enkidu, and she was still hoping to talk her way out of here, though Edward could have saved her the trouble. There was no way Enkidu would let her go again without a fight.

"Enough," Bella said, and she pulled back until the chain broke and Enkidu was left holding the pendant. She'd had the clunky thing around her neck so long, that she almost looked naked without it. "I've told you what I have to do. I'll go and then I'll come back."

Ginnie hadn't said a word since "Isabella," but now she let out a startled cry. For a moment Edward thought she was reacting to Bella's lie, but while he'd been distracted, Demetri had arrived along with Jane and Alec. Edward wasn't sure whether they were here to help or hurt, but Enkidu's paranoia kicked in the moment he saw them.

"You've gone to them," he told Bella. "After everything I've done for you."

"I haven't," she said, but she could see that words wouldn't stand a chance of reaching him now. She edged closer to Edward, and as her stress level rose, the fear started to crackle in the air, making the wolves howl and snarl and the Volturi guards stop in their tracks. Ginnie fell back to the far side of the fire.

Edward reached his hand out to hold her underneath her elbow as though he was supporting her weight. Enkidu raised his eyebrows into his dark hairline and looked at Edward for a long moment. He shot a glance toward the wolves, and Edward knew he was going to order them to attack him, but Bella had seen that look too.

"Don't," she said. "Don't do this."

But he'd already sliced his hand through the air, and the large grey wolf leapt toward Edward while Enkidu tugged Bella forward into his arms.


	18. Bella

Thank God it was only the one wolf.

Maybe Enkidu didn't think it would take more than one to kill a newborn. Maybe the other ten were attacking the Volturi. Edward couldn't see past the rush of grey fur, and when his hands came up to protect his neck, he felt fangs dig deep in his forearm. The pain was warm and wet. Matted fur brushed his skin, and in an oddly detached moment, he found himself wishing he'd kept his filthy shirt on.

All around him there was snarling and shouting and sharp thoughts in quick succession. He couldn't sort the voices by their owners, but none of them were from Bella's mind, and that was all that mattered. He wanted to hear her again before he died. It didn't seem like so much to ask. Hell, if he were really asking, he wanted a day with her, far from here, losing at chess and washing out clothes at the river. He would know what to do with a gift like that now.

The pain had stopped, or he'd stopped processing it, but he knew his right arm was a jagged mess. He could feel the fangs tearing back out through his flesh as the wolf released him so it could try again for his throat.

Bella

Had he called out, or was her name in his mind? There had to be a way to get closer. Only a second had passed since the wolf had torn into him, but he'd been knocked from his feet. He pulled back and attempted a shove at the too hot creature above him. Its jaws snapped close to his ear. There was no getting around it; if he was right about what Enkidu had done earlier, he had a means to fight back, so he made himself bite into the fur and flesh of the shoulder above him and managed to suck in a mouthful of bitter blood. It burned going down and spreading to his limbs, but there was power in it. He tried to force the wolf off again, and this time it flew backwards to the far side of the fire.

Ginnie was covered in blood and leaning over him, a tuft of grey fur in her fist. She'd been trying to pull the beast backwards, and that was a revelation. He knew she could fight – from the look of it, she'd taken down one of the smaller wolves – but he hadn't known she would fight for him.

_Isabella_

Everyone's thoughts were so loud that it was difficult to find the source of her name.

On the far side of the fire, he could see wolves circling and snapping at the other two Volturi. Jane had a nasty gash gaping at her throat, and she was laid out on the ground with only Alec to protect her.

The grey wolf had righted itself and was charging back toward Edward at a speed that made him brace for the hit. He caught a flash of light from his left. Demetri had pulled a burning branch from the flames and he moved in front of Ginnie to swing at anything that got close. Edward hadn't thought he wanted a Volturi near him, but the torch was working. The grey wolf skidded to a halt and began to circle while Demetri tried to stay out in front to hold it back. There were more wolves coming, and they cut off any path that would have let Edward near the fire. As they fanned out, Demetri wasn't going to be able to keep all of them back.

"Isabella!"

That was definitely Demetri's voice. Edward followed his gaze to the right to find Bella struggling with Enkidu and pushing him back. He stumbled but kept to his feet.

All told, it had been ten long seconds, and the circling wolf was ready to leap again.

Bella turned to it, and fear blossomed exponentially until Edward could taste it in the air, metallic and sharp against his teeth.

The wolf let out a whine that was half defiance, half wail, and blood spattered its muzzle. Its body collapsed so close to Edward that red flecked his bare feet.

He found her mind then – not thoughts, but something like the force behind a crashing wave. It felt like taking the next step on a staircase only to find that there was nothing there. She was going to snuff the life out of everyone here. If she wanted, she would make the entire world go away. There would be nothing left but her and the darkness and empty space. A sensation like nausea hit him. _I know these thoughts. It's not true. She won't hurt me. She won't._ He could feel himself shaking; a primal warning was blaring at the base of his skull, telling him to flee, but he was still standing, and he'd be damned if fear would drive him away from her.

The sickness receded, enough that he was able to react when Demetri grabbed for his arm, but it wasn't an attack. The guard's thoughts were a babble of incoherent terror. He was going to run, and Edward said, "Stay here. You're safer here." He took the torch from him, and only then did he realize that the rest of the wolves were laid out on the ground. Some were thrashing, but most had gone still, as though the fear had simply stopped their hearts.

"Dae, cease this now," Enkidu said.

With nothing left but whimpering and a low whine from Jane across the way, Edward moved past the fire to find Bella on the platform ahead.

"The last time I was Dae," she said, "the world was a different place."

"Not so different. Only a few moments ever alter the course of our lives. The night I turned you, I could feel how important it was that you became one of us. The night you slunk away, I knew it was wrong for you to be anywhere but at my side."

"I came back to explain, but you'd disappeared."

"You expected me to wait for you?" he asked.

"I expected nothing."

Enkidu put his hands behind his back and began to pace. "Why would you leave at all?"

"You weren't… I couldn't…"

"Try not to mumble."

A shudder passed over her, but she squared her shoulders and answered. "It was Ur. The temples and open air markets, the way humans had lifted themselves up. I didn't want to treat them like cattle anymore."

"Because they'd managed to throw a few stones on top one another? If I'd realized you were that easy to impress –"

"I _was_ that easy. Look how I followed you around like a dog for so long, happy with any scrap of approval."

"Watch your words, Dae."

Edward could hardly mind his own. How dare he talk to Bella like she was an ignorant child. She was practically chanting at Edward in her head though. _Quiet now. Let me. I understand him better than anyone. Don't interfere_. So he watched and waited, knowing it could not go as well as she hoped.

"After I left you," she said, "I started to question our right to live like Gods among them."

"Their blood offerings were freely given, surely better than hunting them down and taking what's ours by force."

"You just wanted to see them on their knees. They knew the consequences of defying you."

"Or you."

"Enough. This is getting us nowhere. I have to go."

"You will not leave."

Enkidu raised his hands as though to restrain her, but he was shaking. Bella had been wrong about him; the fear she inflicted wasn't a thrill for him after all. It was as painful as the wolf's blood was bitter, but he felt a huge sense of satisfaction with every moment that he could remain standing in the face of it. For all Edward knew, he was probably the type that liked to flog himself as well. Whatever he was doing to stay strong, Enkidu was still managing to form complete sentences.

It was better than the others. Ginnie had started wailing in the background. Demetri grabbed her arm and pulled her – even as she thrashed and hissed at him – backwards into the trees where they stumbled to the ground. Alec had managed to drag his sister only a few feet before he'd collapsed, shuddering across her. The tear in her neck was so deep that her head was almost severed, and venom poured from the wound like water.

Only Bella, Edward and Enkidu were standing, and for the latter two, it was a near thing.

"Edward, go," she said. _Please don't be stubborn. Just this once._

He didn't even bother to say no. He shoved back at the voice of doom in his head with its dire warnings and listened to her mind instead. She was still holding back, and she wanted him gone so she could really bring Enkidu quaking to his knees and leave him alive. There were flickers of her past, dark memories of the two of them together, Bella just behind Enkidu as they entered a village at night, Bella standing before him as he set his hands on her shoulders and pushed her down. Edward didn't think she would ever be free as long as Enkidu was alive, and he couldn't say he was sorry, because it helped to excuse the fact that he was going to kill her maker. Even if it meant she didn't forgive him. Better to set her free and let her write him off as a reckless newborn than let Enkidu have any hold on her.

"Edward," her voice was soft this time, coaxing him to give in, but she could just forget it.

She turned her attention back to Enkidu. "Let me take him home. I swear on my honor I will come back and make things right with you." This time it wasn't a lie. Though Edward knew she had some fucked up issues about debts and about the way she'd let this man treat her like shit for the small matter of _several hundred years_ , her willingness to drop Edward off and come back felt like a hard knot of grief and fury. Even if she was only doing it to keep Edward safe… No, _especially_ if it was for him.

"What is he to you?" Enkidu was shaking so hard that it was difficult to understand him, but he didn't look humbled by it. In fact, he seemed unreasonably proud. If anything dampened his sense of triumph, it was that Edward was still here too, and obviously less affected. "Why does it mean so much? He's only a child."

She opened her mouth but didn't speak. The way she was looking at Edward now was at odds with the ridiculous voice trying to convince him that she was Death. He'd never seen her so open. And then he realized why. She knew. He saw the thought flash in her mind and couldn't help but choke on his breath. She knew that he was her mate. She wouldn't say it to Enkidu, wouldn't say it to him either; hell, she would hardly even let herself look at the thought, but she knew, and it was there on her face for both of them to see.

Enkidu's lunge was so immediate and unplanned that Edward didn't catch the intent until he felt himself being knocked back. He managed to stay on his feet, but to keep his balance he reached out. It was a mistake. His attacker growled, "She's mine," and caught Edward by his ravaged arm and pushed up and back until the bone splintered and snapped. Even with all the sound around them, the break was loud in Edward's ear, and he looked down to see his arm hanging limp. Venom, pale like green tea, ran from the wound, and when he realized he was losing his mind enough to compare venom to tea he knew he was in trouble.

"She's mine," Enkidu said.

 _No, she's her own_ , he thought, but the breath had been knocked out of him, and he found he couldn't speak. Enkidu raised an arm to strike him again, but Bella stood behind his shoulder, and she yanked his head back with her fist in his hair. Enkidu started to turn but Edward clung to him with his one good arm.

There were no final words. Bella didn't shout, didn't growl. It was over in less than a second. With one hand on Enkidu's neck and another on his jaw, she twisted so hard that Edward found himself covered in venom and struggling with a now-headless body. Nothing in his life had prepared him for a moment this surreal. The arms didn't let go of him. The body stumbled, and the hands were clawing blindly now. Edward forced the thing back and looked over at Enkidu's shocked face. His thoughts were a haze of disbelief as his eyes searched below him and only found air. The one person that Enkidu was sure would be unable to defy him, the one he hadn't bothered to defend against, was clutching his hair in her fist. The blind body lurched back toward Edward and didn't crumple until Bella cast her maker's head sideways into the fire.

That was not how Edward had expected this to go. He should have been relieved, but it was going to take a moment for his mind to catch up. He fell to his knees. Even with the wolves and Enkidu dead, the clearing was a tumult of sound, and Ginnie was wailing in such a full throated expression of terror that he wished for her sake that she could black out.

Bella hadn't moved. One arm was still lifted toward the fire.

"Please, can you stop?" he asked her. It was the least he could do for Ginnie after she'd come to his aid in the fight.

Bella jumped backwards. She looked toward the trees as though she would run, but she wasn't willing to leave him alone with Alec.

"You don't have to leave. Just make the fear stop."

She took a few breaths. He could feel her trying, but it would be awhile before she could settle down enough to not frighten the others.

"You killed him," he said. Apparently he was a master of the obvious.

"He hurt you."

And there it was. Perhaps the closest to a declaration that he would ever get from his mate. He wanted to make her say more, but when he listened to her mind, she was already replaying the last minute, looking for ways it could have gone down without requiring her maker's death.

The gift of life or not, Enkidu was an asshole, but it wouldn't do to tell her that right now. "How did you know the wolves would be so susceptible to your gift?" he asked to distract her.

"I didn't."

Her words were a rough monotone, and he thought it was time for him to step up to the plate. He scrambled to his feet.

"Sit. Do your breathing thing."

She looked at him like he'd lost his mind, or maybe she was just startled that he was taking control. He wasn't sure, because all he could get from her was that the evening air was warm as it moved in and out of her, carrying the scent of dead leaves and moist earth.

The stupid mantra in the back of his head that kept trying to tell him that everyone was about to die at Bella's hands was now only repeating that he might be maimed, which seemed so ridiculous that he almost laughed. Maybe relief was making him lightheaded. He had half a mind to grab her by the waist and swing her around, but Ginnie was still wailing, and he guessed he should at least look at Jane long enough to find out if she'd still be walking around tomorrow. He didn't really know what would happen if her head was severed but not burned. That sort of question hadn't been part of his education.

It turned out that her head was only mostly severed – _and wasn't that an odd phrase_ – but Alec gave him a hard glare when he tried to get a better look at Jane's wound, probably sensing that Edward's interest held far more morbid curiosity than concern.

"She only needs time to heal," Alec said. It was hard to believe that the sticky mush that used to be her neck was going to right itself, but Alec would have seen enough fights to know. "Isabella should return with us to Volterra. Caius will want to thank her personally for her assistance."

"Assistance my ass. She did your job for you." The words were out before he even knew he wanted to say them, and he had half a mind to grab Alec by the collar and see what came of a fight. It wouldn't be a fair match, not with Bella to back him up, but then again, he'd spent the last week in a pit thanks entirely to Alec's bosses, and he didn't feel inclined to worry about the moral ambiguities of kicking the guy's ass. He took a step back though. It would be childish to draw Bella into another fight he couldn't win on his own. His own self control made him smile, and he knew Alec thought he was a little crazy for it, but who the hell cared what Alec thought.

"I'll leave you to her," Edward said, and crossed to where Ginnie was huddled at the base of a tree with her knees up and her arms banded across her shins. There was a clicking sound, and it took him a moment to realize her teeth were chattering. At least she wasn't screeching anymore.

"Are you alright?" he asked.

"Fucking peachy."

Edward looked to Demetri who merely shrugged. The fact that Ginnie could throw around a little attitude meant that Bella's attempt to calm down was working.

"The next time Isabella does that," Ginnie said, "I'm damn well going to be holed up in my apartment, on the other side of the earth, watching a movie, grandfather or no grandfather. Jesus H., I thought I was dead for sure. I thought _everyone_ was dead. The wolves were like teddy bears compared to the shit she just put me through. Did you feel that?"

"Uhm… we all did," Edward said.

Demetri gave him a hard look. "You and Enkidu seemed to do all right. I noticed you were able to stand your ground. Why is that, do you think?"

Edward shrugged. Let him think what he wanted.

"So a newborn suddenly has the will to handle it when three Volturi guards couldn't?"

"Maybe that says something about the Volturi."

Demetri shook his head. "Maybe it has something to do with why Isabella was so determined to get you back."

"Enough," Bella said. Edward hadn't heard her walk towards them. "Demetri, I need you to get us a ship. Buy it outright, and hire someone to pilot it."

Demetri blinked. "You want me to buy you a ship."

"I took care of your situation, so I think Caius can afford it. Head back to Mumbai. Then meet us due east of here off the coast."

"But I have to return to Volterra. I did what you asked."

"Whine much?" Edward asked.

Ginnie cracked the first smile Edward had ever seen from her, and Demetri sighed as he realized that no one here was going to take his side.

"Make sure the captain is one of our kind," Bella said. She glanced over at Alec, but he was concentrating only on his sister, and she lowered her voice to say, "You found Edward, and you had no part in the kidnapping, so you've earned one friendly warning, Demetri. You don't want to be in Volterra for long."

"What do you mean?"

Edward wondered as well, but Bella was counting in Greek. That was new. He wanted to call her on keeping him out of her head, but he couldn't without Demetri knowing about his gift. He would add this to the growing list of things to confront her with in private. Since he'd been holding back on pretty much every impulse he'd had for the last several days, why not a few more hours?

"Wait, he's going back to Volterra?" Ginnie asked.

"Just for…" Demetri looked completely at a loss. "I have to report back to Aro. And anyway, I didn't want to presume… didn't know if you would want… I mean I could take some time away to –"

"Oh forget it." Ginnie brushed off her jean skirt and marched past them back to the fire.

"It's not like I can't find you anywhere," he called.

"Go," Bella said. "I don't want to be here long."

"I shouldn't leave Alec, not until Jane heals. There's one last werewolf somewhere around here. The woman who was guarding Edward. If she returns and you're not here to put her down, Alec may not be able to fight her off."

"Enkidu's dead. She won't be immune to Alec's gift, and she's probably long gone anyway."

"All right then," he said, but he didn't take his eyes off Ginnie's back. Then he shook himself. Though Bella was calm now, Demetri would rather submit to anything than feel her power again. He gave her a small bow, turned, and set off at a run.

"So," Edward said.

Bella just looked at him.

"Do we have to check on Jane?" he asked.

"She'll probably survive." Apparently a beetle in front of Bella's broom warranted more care than Jane, and though Edward didn't know the girl, he could guess what kind of person she had to be to illicit a response that cold.

"We're going home then?" As soon as he said it, he realized that Bella might think he meant Carlisle's house. "To the cabin."

"We'll head east and wait at the shore. Swim out to the ship when it comes." She smiled for the first time all night, and he thought he might need to sit down. Did she not know what that would do to him now that he was flooded with relief? "You're the one who would know what Demetri's planning," she said. _Didn't you read his mind?_

"Demetri won't do anything to cross you. Not after tonight. He'll get the boat."

_Good. All right._

"So we're alone now," he said.

 _We're not alone._ She cut her eyes over to Alec and Jane.

"They're no threat to you."

"How is your arm?"

"Healing already." He managed to swing it slightly forward with only a wince. The break in the skin had already smoothed over, but it felt like the bone beneath was still knitting itself back together.

"Good." She laid her hand lightly on his injured arm. "We should get Ginnie and go then. It could be a day before the boat is here, but there's no reason to stay."

"You're not going to avoid me anymore," he said. "There are things I want to say to you, things I need to know."

"On the boat, then."

Did she never get tired of putting him off? She knew, for fuck's sake. She knew what they were to one another, and she still probably thought she should give him a few hundred years to 'grow up'.

"Fine, on the boat. But you'll hear me out. You won't leave all the time."

"Where am I going to go on a boat?"

"You didn't answer my question."

_Edward._

"I mean it."

She leaned in and then she did the damndest thing. She tilted her head up to press her lips against his neck. She might as well have thrown him to the ground and mounted his hips for all the shock he felt at her making the overture instead of just giving in to his. "We'll talk as soon as we board the ship if that's what you want." Her breath was soft, and she pressed her lips to him again, and _dear God_ , she had found the most effective way yet to distract him from his purpose. Her touch – even tentative like this – would've been everything he wanted if he didn't suspect that it was yet another defense. How nervous did she have to be for touching him to be less unsettling than honesty? Her mind was a blank of sensation, and it served to keep him out. He would put an end to that. She was right after all; she wasn't going to get away from him on this slow trip back by ship.


	19. Touch

Edward should have known his resolve would crack. He'd been thrown in a pit, strung out on human blood, bitten by a werewolf, mauled by a headless body and kissed by the woman who should be his. Given the demon circus that was this past week, it didn't take a genius to figure out that his tenuous hold on self control would vanish with one slender hand on his thigh.

His plan had been simple: board the boat and then shut down anything that wasn't an emotional confession from Bella – and yes, maybe that made him a teen-aged girl bent on hearing how much she was loved, but he deserved some sort of declaration. If he thought Bella was his mate, and Bella had had even a flicker of the same thought once, didn't that make it true? So he needed to stick to the plan, make her talk the moment the ship was out to sea, refuse to let her distract him.

The morning had held no nasty surprises. He'd pocketed Bella's pendant when he'd seen it glinting in the dirt, and they'd hunted sambar before settling in on the beach. Ginnie's mouth had been quiet, even if her mind had not, while Bella stood still so long that the wind-blown sand buried her ankles. Edward had chucked hunks of sodden driftwood back to the sea until the beach was bare. Then he'd seen the ship through the haze.

"About time," Ginnie said. "Swear to the Gods, my denim is starting to bleach."

The boat was nothing like he'd expected. He'd had visions of the three of them and the pilot huddled together in barely more than a dinghy, but Demetri had shelled out a fortune if he'd bought this dark blue yacht.

"Stay here," Bella said.

He watched Bella swim out, because honestly when _didn't_ he watch her, but before she reached the yacht, he knew it was their ride; there was a garish, white shimmer on the deck that could only be a vampire in the sun.

"C'mon," he told Ginnie. She must have seen it too, because she'd kicked off her shoes and clutched them by the straps as she hit the water at a run, thinking of a massive red and orange tiled shower that was probably part of her apartment back home. "Where do you live anyway?" he asked, but she was already underwater, and he could probably just lift it from her thoughts later.

The boat was even more impressive up close, and her captain had to be at least six feet tall, with a salt and pepper braid that reached down to her thighs. She had a big laugh and little laugh lines around the eyes to match.

"Don't be so hard on Demetri when you see him," the woman was telling Bella. "Whatever you said had him scrambling to buy my baby outright, but she's not for sale." She ran her hand across the white railing. "Demetri could have kept searching, but how many of our kind are hanging around Mumbai with boats for sale? Besides, all you need is safe passage, right, and I'm on my way home anyway." She looked over at Edward and Ginnie dripping on her deck and crossed to them, shaking both their hands. "Mary Smith. Glad to know you. So…" She turned to Bella. "Are we good? I'll take you up through the Suez and west across the Mediterranean, and then once we refuel, it'll be a straight shot to the states."

"How long will it take?" Ginnie asked.

"Depends on the wind and weather. Somewhere around sixteen days."

What difference did the time make? They were alive and free and Edward had Bella back again. He poked his head into the main cabin and spotted the wheel, or whatever it was called, and a door that led him to two back bedrooms, one of which had a pile of clothes on the bed. Mary's then. There was a third, tiny bedroom in the deck above. Just enough space for the big talk he hoped to have, though its relative privacy was a lie when Ginnie and Mary would be able to hear everything.

He jumped over the railing from the top deck to the lower one and realized they were talking about him.

"... so you'll almost have to sit on him through the canal and then for much of the Mediterranean. Lots of boats will pass us," Mary said. "Close enough for him to scent human blood."

"It won't be a problem," Bella told her.

She hadn't said, _I can control him_ , or worse yet, _l won't let him do anything stupid_. Just, _It won't be a problem._ He turned his face up to the sun so that his smile would look like a squint. Mary's thoughts gave away her doubts about Edward behaving, but it didn't matter.

"Well, we're clear from here to Ethiopia, so we don't have a problem yet," Mary said. "And of course we'll stop so he can hunt."

"Ginnie and I will hunt. We'll bring him deer, or whatever is close at hand."

Gold eyes were the sign of an odd, sentimental madness, as far as Mary was concerned. She couldn't stifle a snort when Demetri had first explained their diet. Now, faced with Bella, she chose to say nothing. Despite her cheery exterior, she already wished she'd turned this job down, and she'd have plenty to say to Demetri the next time she saw him. Apparently he hadn't warned her that it was uncomfortable to be around Bella, but just her thought reminded Edward of how different his own reaction was.

He came around and put a hand on Bella's wrist. "I need to talk to you."

"Now?"

He reminded her of a gristmill the way he circled around one thought all the time.

"A gristmill? Seriously, Bella, you're going to need some new analogies."

_Give it a few thousand years, Edward, and see how much of the world is familiar to you._

"No age talk," he said. "You said you'd listen once we were at sea."

For a moment her mind jumped so quickly he couldn't follow. Was it fear that made her imagine diving into the sea or finding a reason to talk to Mary again? She marched past him and took the ladder to the top deck. When he followed her into the wood paneled cabin, she was already sitting on the edge of the narrow cot.

"Alright," she said. "Talk." Her arms were crossed, and she looked like him in one of his moods, all prickly dread and stubborn refusal. He took a seat on the floor and leaned against the only exit.

"Why did you come to India for me?"

That wasn't the opener she'd been expecting, and he caught the momentary image of Carlisle in her mind.

"Was it for his sake?" Edward asked.

"You were in my care, mine to protect…" She dropped her arms and pulled her feet up underneath her. "Mine to avenge if you were dead."

"Yours in more ways than you realize."

She shook her head. "Two years ago you were human. Only two months ago you didn't want anything to do with me. You threw me against a wall."

"I told you I was sorry. I can't –"

"Actually, you didn't."

"What? But I…" He shifted forward the few feet between the door and the foot of the bed so that his head was level with her knees. "I am sorry. I've thought it many times. I should have told you. I know I wasn't easy to get along with at the start."

She reached out to push her fingers through his hair, and he could hear the yearning when she thought, _I want…_ but it trailed off into silence. "I didn't mean… I just wanted to remind you that your life is shifting like sand. You can't be sure your feelings –"

"Don't tell me what I feel." He was up and moving forward so fast that she leaned back against the bed between his hands. "There's bloodlust too. Are you going to tell me _that's_ just a phase?"

"It will weaken as you grow but no, you'll never be free of it."

"You're my mate. I'll never be free of you either. I don't want to be."

"Edward." His name was barely an exhalation. "The idea that every one of us has a mate, it's just a myth."

"But I heard you. You thought about me that way. In front of Enkidu."

"Your life was in danger."

"So, what then? It doesn't count?"

"That's not… Look, I'll admit that I've wondered why you're different, why the fear doesn't get to you so much. Less and less, it seems. That's never happened before."

She slid out from between his arms until her back hit the headboard. Not wanting to lose the proximity, Edward crawled up until he was next to her.

"But," she said, "that doesn't mean there isn't some other explanation that would make more sense than this idea of mates. We can live for an eternity, as far as I know. Why would there be one person meant for you who's born thousands of years apart? What if Carlisle hadn't found you? What if-"

"He did find me, and I'm here now."

"But…" She lay her hand across his thigh. She didn't drag her nails or rub back and forth. She just lay it flat against his still damp and filthy jeans. He probably disgusted her, but no, he didn't get that from her mind. She shifted between thoughts of fear and desire like a flame guttering, but at least she wasn't putting off a vibe that would have had their captain curling into a fetal ball down below.

"I think you know what I want," he said. "What do you want?" He caught her thought even as she opened her mouth to speak, and he interrupted. "Not what you think you _should_ want. The truth. If you really don't want me with you, then there's nothing to talk about. I'll go back to Carlisle's and you won't have to look after me anymore." He let out a cracked sound that masqueraded as a laugh. "If nothing else, I think I've learned enough to not destroy the family."

He'd given her the opening to let him down easy. The way his stomach had felt when he'd gone over the cliff near her cabin… he had a very good reminder of it now.

"Or," he continued, "maybe you do have feelings for me, whether you want to or not."

Her mind slipped away from him. She went so still that she was no longer breathing.

"Give me something," he said. "Come back. Please."

She drew her hand up his thigh to his hip where her thumb chafed across the bone above the frayed waistband of his jeans. When she turned toward him, she set her closed mouth against his jaw and then his temple – small, puckered kisses in slow succession, as though she had to check his response to every advance. He couldn't fathom why she treated him like a bomb, though he did tremble with the effort not to twist over and pin her. Nothing was worth the risk that she might stop her exploration. Her touches felt familiar, as though he'd always known she'd be like this, maddeningly attentive to every brush against skin, every strand of his hair. All that focus turned on him, like a magnifying glass sharpening light into heat. He was hard just from the languorous touches and teasing breaths, but he told himself he wasn't going to demand more – he was _always_ the one demanding more. He let his head bump the headboard behind, and with a broken sound, he gave himself over to her careful fingers, letting her do whatever she wanted.

What she wanted was to move down to his neck and across his collar bone, testing every response and memorizing the feel of him. The salt water had sloughed off the dried blood and earth, but he still wondered if he was clean enough for her. In her mind there was just the feel of bone and muscle beneath pale skin that shivered at her touch, of healed ribs and the cool zipper of his jeans easing down in measured steps that had him beating his feet into the mattress so that the rest of him could stay still. He'd imagined that when things went this far, his hands would be all over her, even in her, but she seemed content to set the tempo and map out his skin like so much territory to explore, and anyway there was something incredible in holding back, in not trying to get his own way, because his jeans were undone now, and she pressed her palm to the fabric before lifting his erection out, almost pulsing in her hand while the crease in the denim bit into his balls and made them ache.

"Uhnf," he said. It was meant to be a word, something about _Yes_ , and _For pity's sake_ , but nothing coherent was making its way out of his mouth. Thankfully, he had the presence of mind to reach a hand out and wrap around her neck so he could kiss her on the mouth for the first time since the fight for their lives. He had faith that he could do this much without flying apart and pounding into her, finishing this intensity between them in a few seconds. This kiss was the one place he took the lead – eyes wide open, though hers were shut – and it was pushy and rough and wet, with his tongue driving into her mouth and leaving no room for her to push back. It was probably an awful kiss. It spoke of everything he wanted to wrest from her. If there had been a way for him to take attachment and affection by force, he probably would have. As it was, he was almost grateful that he was unable to bend her to his needs. She would love him or she wouldn't of her own free will. One day he'd know the answer, but right now her fingers started a light movement up and down his cock.

"Don't stop, _don'tstop_."

She thought his skin felt soft, while all he felt was that he was hard enough to hurt, but she kept trailing lazy fingers up and down with no pressure.

"So nice," she whispered.

Picnics were nice. Ducklings, bouquets… This was nothing like nice. Every muscle was pulled tight, and he was caught between the reality of her hands finally on him and the need to gamble for more.

"Please." It came out like a whine, drawn out on the vowels, and she looked up to his face for a moment, unsure of what he wanted.

"Everything. Anything you can give me. Whatever," he said.

She blinked at him – even that was slow – and leaned forward to flick her tongue along his bicep, his chest, his taut stomach held tight in anticipation. He thought he'd die like a butterfly on a pin while she learned the taste of his shoulder, the way he shivered when she ran her lips along his chest. When she leaned down and flicked her tongue across his erection, she elicited a shout from him so loud that it startled her backwards.

"There are things I don't need to hear." Ginnie's muffled call came from the deck below, and he had a quick fantasy of pitching her as far as he could out onto the waves. Maybe he could make her skip like a stone.

Bella's look was a question.

"Fine, I'm fine," he said. "I just. It's been years since anyone's touched me, and even that I can hardly remember. Some girl near the university who had a van with carpeting in the back, and oh shit, I did not just say that."

Bella smile could brighten anything, even this narrow, wood paneled cave of a room. Even the inside of his body felt alight. "Alright," she said. She leaned down again, and this time she took him in her mouth.

"Oh fuck, oh fuck." He whispered it so low that even Bella probably couldn't hear.

Her teeth grazed him. She held him still in her mouth until he was ready to thrust his hands into her hair and tug, but then she started to move, and he burrowed his fingers right into the mattress and thought about Ginnie being close by, wondered if Bella had done this for Enkidu - any thought revolting enough to keep himself from coming immediately. If he could hold out two minutes, he'd count it as a success. He chanced a look down at her. She'd pulled her long hair back and around to one shoulder. She had her eyes closed, and she was trembling, and _thank God_ , because if she was going to be calm about this, he would have given up any hope.

 _If I could have… Yes_ , she thought.

"What?" he managed to ask, but she didn't answer – just wrapped her fingers around him while her mouth continued to move up and down, and he could feel his balls tighten. There was no slowing this thing. It was like tumbling down the stairs. He threw his head back, cracking the headboard again and came with a shout, and the shout went on and on, because she didn't pull back from him until it was all over. He could feel her swallow again and again, and the raw intimacy almost hurt. He wondered if that's what she wanted him to feel, how much was on the line for her as well, but she couldn't know that he felt emptied, couldn't read his mind or heart.

"Jesus," he said.

She pulled back and pressed the back of her hand to her mouth before meeting his eyes. "I didn't meet him, but I believe he's more often associated with chastity, charity…"

"Are you... did you just make a joke?"

She leaned in and kissed him, and he could taste himself, bitter on her mouth.

 _I love you,_ he thought. _You're going to rip me to shreds if you don't love me back._

"You're so serious, Edward." She put a hand to the side of his face. "Everything has to be now." She leaned her forehead against his and sighed.

"Can I take it that you guys are done?" Ginnie shouted.

He was going to put her in a box and ship her back to Bat. It must have shown on his face.

"I'll talk to her," Bella said, and she stood up, straightening her shirt.

He was still caught in a tide of torpid satisfaction and hadn't so much as lifted his head, but he managed to say, "It's me you need to talk to."

She had the door half way opened, and she didn't turn around.

"I'm trying. It's not that I don't…"

"Don't what?"

"I've been on my own for so long. And if I let myself believe that there's a chance for us to…"

He waited this time for her to say more, but after a solid minute she was still silhouetted in the doorway.

_I tried to show you, Edward. Don't make me say this right now. Let's go home where I know who I am, and there's no one else but us._

She slipped out of the room.

For a moment he thought she'd have to come back and make some sense of all that, but he was on his own. He kicked the wall, and heard Mary shout, "That's enough damage to my boat up there."

Below him, Ginnie claimed her commentary was only turnabout for Bella walking in on her with Demetri, and Bella was too preoccupied to argue much. Edward lay listening to them until Ginnie dissolved into snickers and offered to paint Bella's nails with polish she'd found in the bathroom cabinet.

The bathroom. He wandered into the tiny cubicle and soaped off the week's worth of frustration and shame that came from being a Volturi pawn in a pit. If Bella hadn't come to get him… well, it was just a good thing for his sanity that he'd never doubted she would. He toweled off and realized he had no other clothes, so he scrubbed the jeans in the shower and threw them on wet. He wore that and slung a white towel over his shoulder, then went down to the main cabin where Mary stood at the helm.

"You're quite the pampered boy," she said with a smile. Her eyes were still on the waves.

There was a time when just that sentence would have sent him into a rage, but she was only joking, amused that it had been his shouts only, not Bella's, that she'd heard. He didn't feel like he needed to explain himself to her.

"I know what I want, at least."

She nodded, still not looking his way. "There are folks who live centuries without knowing that much."

"But what I want isn't mine, so maybe that's worse."

"Better to know where you're going, even if you're lost at the moment. Otherwise, you're just adrift."

"Are we talking about the sea now?"

"She watches you all the time," Mary said.

"Yeah, well, you watch the sea. It's not that big of a boat. We've all got to look somewhere."

"I love the sea."

"Good for you."

She shook her head, and thought about the perils of life with a newborn, and if he didn't hear the word 'newborn' again for a hundred years, it would still be too soon.

"Do you want to take the wheel?"

He didn't, but Bella was still talking to Ginnie, so he was at loose ends. Mary showed him what to do – it was almost nothing really – and left him alone for a while. He tried not to listen to anyone's mind, though Ginnie's thoughts would sometimes break through. He watched the waves and tried to figure out how to get what he wanted from Bella, because it was more, always more, and he didn't want to beg.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Technically Mary is not an original character. Flip to the back of _Breaking Dawn_ , and she's on the list of the American nomads. In canon, she has the brilliant line, "And me," when she agrees with Peter, Charlotte and Randall that she hasn't decided whether to stand with the Cullens against the Volturi.
> 
> I did a little mind-numbing research, but I've been on a boat only once in my adult life (briefly taking the helm of a sailboat that once belonged to Errol Flynn) so please forgive any mistakes.


	20. Homesick

"You're going to get through this," Bella said.

She straddled Edward's ribs, her knees tucked tight against his shoulders, and behind her was Ginnie, butt planted sideways across his shins as she tried to crush him into the bottom of the ship's cramped hold. Their weight felt almost ghostly. He knew he could throw them off, and if he caught the scent of sailors' blood again, he might. He could climb aboard the closest ship and rip out the first throat he found.

Only twice had he been successfully subdued: in the pit, and when Bella used her talent to bring him to the ground back home. There was nothing like the pit here – he could punch his way through the hull – and he wasn't sure Bella could terrify him to the point of immobility anymore.

"You're doing fine," she said. "We won't be this close to other ships once we've left the canal."

That didn't help him now.

 _Only a day and a half since I last drank blood_ , he reminded himself. Bella and Ginnie had hunted the moment they spotted land – the eastern tip of Somalia according to Mary. They'd been a sight, returning with hefty, horned antelope slung across their shoulders. Ginnie had looked ridiculous, but seeing Bella like that had thrown him. For a moment he could imagine her growing up in a world of hunters, Stonehenge, dirt floors and little farms. What struck him was not how long she'd lived – he'd heard more about that than he ever wanted to – but how similar her life was in her cabin with no electricity and her small garden out back. At some point she'd let the world pass her by, and yet she'd set out into the unfamiliar to fetch him back from fear and guilt and human blood.

There it was, that red smell again, like a fresh cut, like salvation, and he was back in the ship's hold struggling to be still.

"Tell me something about your life," he said.

"My life?"

"If you don't do something, I'm about six seconds from causing a scene the Volturi won't be able to ignore."

Bella's mind shuffled through images until it stopped on a cracked stone covered in snow.

"I'll tell you about my time with the Romanian coven."

"Ugh, a bunch of men," Ginnie said. "And that's only two centuries before me. Tell us about the Daughters of Set."

"This is the story I want to tell him, and we're concentrating on Edward."

Ginnie threw her head back, weight shifting onto her palms, and rolled her eyes. "Aren't we always?"

"Tell me something," Edward said, "or I'm going to rip through the hull." To show them how easy it would be, he popped his knees up and sent Ginnie tumbling onto a nearby crate.

Bella jammed her thighs so tight to his sides that he could've sworn he heard a rib start to splinter. "Listen, then, be still. This was a long time ago; I was less than three thousand years old, and it used to be that when you travelled through Thrace or Pannonia –"

"Pannonia?" Edward asked.

"Just listen."

He nodded. So far he still wanted to shred something.

"When we travelled the lands surrounding the Romanians, we were supposed to pay a visit to the far side of the woods." She must have seen his next question on his face, because she said, "Transylvania. The name is Latin for the far side of the woods."

"Okay." It was going to take more than a list of place names to get him through this.

"I think their rulers were bored, confined in one castle so long. Their custom was to change their entire families, so there was no shortage of them, but they got tired of one another. Everyone in that city knew what we were. The coven brought in humans caught further afield in raids on the Goths and the Huns, because otherwise the city's population would have fled or attacked. The Romanians were ruled by three, just like the Volturi. Ivan, Stefan and Vladimir. Ivan and Vlad were extremely close, and Stefan was Ivan's brother. Ivan could move objects without touching them."

"It's called telekinesis," Ginnie said.

Bella shrugged. "Whatever the word, Stefan and Vlad had no special talents, and when Ivan found out that the Volturi were sending the witch twins, he decided to keep the two men safe."

This wasn't working – a history lesson when he was going to turn inside out. Edward's feet pounded on the hull floor. There was blood out there, so close and far richer than animal blood. He realized he'd been shaking, and Ginnie was now holding him more firmly, her hands tight around his ankles.

"What does any of this have to do with you?" he asked. If he sounded restless and irritable, she'd have to let him off the hook, given the situation.

She laid a hand across his chest and leaned down. "I'm coming to that part." Her mouth was so near to his that he kept expecting a touch. "I'd been close enough that I decided to pay my respects. I liked the Romanians. A few of them enjoyed music and dancing and big, raucous fights… Don't give me that look, Edward. I didn't always stick close to home. Besides, the Romanians used to pretend I didn't bother them; the first one to leave the hall would be ridiculed for their fear."

"Too much testosterone," Ginnie said.

"Maybe so, but unlike some, they never complained about the way I made them feel."

That barb might've hit home, because Ginnie looked away.

"I knew something had happened when the castle was empty. Ivan, Stefan and Vlad – they were never far from their thrones. I found Ivan's body hanging by the ankle from a Laurel tree. His head was gone. There was a scorch mark where a bonfire had been. I didn't know at the time that Caius had sent Alec and Jane to dispatch them all. I wandered the castle looking for survivors, and it wasn't until I was leaving that I heard a series of taps, like sleet but uneven.

"It came from below a slab of granite, flat beneath the snow. Something had cracked it, but it still held. It took me a while to shift it on my own. Vlad and Stefan were there where Ivan had trapped them. They forced their way up and out the moment I freed them, and it was Vlad who found Ivan first and pulled his body down. I offered to help them search for others, but they asked me to leave. I don't think they wanted to show grief any more than fear."

"What happened to them?" Edward asked.

"They were still alive the last I heard. I suppose they weren't much of a threat to the Volturi without Ivan and the rest of their coven."

Ginnie looked skeptical. "They haven't sought revenge?"

"They're as pragmatic as you Vikings. I imagine they're waiting for a sign that the Volturi are growing weak." She sat up, taking that full mouth away from his, and Edward lifted his head as though to follow. She thought he was struggling to get free, and she said, "Just a little longer. You've done so well. I think we're nearing the end."

As the ships were released into the Mediterranean, they drifted further from each other, until he only caught the scent of blood, layered beneath fishing nets and oil drums, when the wind brought it closer.

"Let me up."

Ginnie was quick to scramble off of him and away, but Bella stayed where she was.

"You need to stay here where the scent won't affect you until we're into the Atlantic, but you did well," she said.

"I did. I deserve a reward."

"When we get across to Portugal, we'll go for a swim."

"That's the sort of reward you think I have in mind?"

"Trust me. It'll be a good swim. You and me."

It sounded damned near perfect actually, and when did his life ever go that well, so he should have known she was hiding something. In his defense, he was distracted. Her offer held the promise of touch, and on top of that, he could still sometimes catch blood in the air. So he lay there, oblivious to any changes afoot, and after a day of being buried beneath wooden crates while the boat heaved up and down in a storm, he was hungry (nothing new), brooding (what a surprise), and ready to be in the open sea.

It was night when Bella returned to lift the trap door to the hull where he lay beneath Mary's cargo.

"We're out far enough. Come up. Come swimming," she said.

"What if we lose sight of the boat?" he asked, but he let her take his hand and bring him to the deck where the moonlight made the low whitecaps glow.

"Mary dropped anchor. But even if she hadn't, the ship's putting along at less than half our speed."

"Why didn't we just swim home?"

She smiled as she hopped up on the railing, and with a firm tug she sent them both splashing into the water in all their clothes. Not that "all their clothes" was much for Edward; having refused something from Mary that looked like a muumuu, he still only had the jeans he'd been wearing when the Volturi nabbed him.

"Because it's easy to get lost in the open sea and waste time heading off course. Anyway, did you want to spend over a week under water?"

 _I just want to go home_ , he thought, but he shook his head.

Bella was thinking of home too, of that stripped-clean scent near the river where the new growth competed for the little bit of sun that spotted the forest floor.

"We'll be there soon," he said.

She gave him a sorry little smile, then slapped the water so it splashed him. Before he could sputter, she'd dropped under the waves. She was wearing shorts and a too-large white shirt that Mary had loaned her, and he could see her slipping like a stream of light beneath the surface. It set off his instinct to chase, as if she were some gorgeous, woman-shaped ball of string he needed to catch.

He was fast. Even in the water, he was faster than anyone else. It took a matter of seconds before he reached out and caught her around the middle, the white blouse billowing, and her hair snapping back behind her as he tugged her close.

They started to sink. Neither of them was swimming now, and they left the light above them and drifted down together past silver schools of fish and down, even darker, colder, to the coral beneath. Something scuttled out of the way as they touched sand.

She put her hands on the back of his neck and pulled him closer so she could move her mouth against his with no finesse whatsoever. It made him smile. Everything felt better when Bella wasn't cool and perfect. He couldn't tell her, so he just hummed the last of his breath into the water in bubbles that probably made him look ridiculous. He pushed her cloudy hair aside, and she kissed his throat, ran her hands up and down his tender ribs, wrapped her legs around his waist to cling, weightless, as she grazed his collar bone with teeth. One hand shifted lower to rub on his jeans, and for a moment he was tempted to let her have whatever she wanted.

_Not this time._

He wanted to make her moan too, or at least gurgle out the last of her breath, wanted to give her so many sensations that she wouldn't be able to focus on just one. He put his hands up under her arms and lifted her so her chin rested atop his head, and he could lean in to suckle her breast, though the material got in his way, and he had to flick it up and around her neck so he could put his mouth directly on her skin. He touched his teeth to her, tasting salt water, and pulled on her nipple as his hands rubbed circles along her spine.

She threw her head back, and perhaps he'd found a way to make her desperate, though her thoughts were still centered on him, the feel of his shoulders beneath her hands. He wanted her mind on herself. Without moving his mouth, he shifted his hand lower to the inside of her thigh and pushed two fingers beneath the hem of her shorts. She shuddered and pulled back enough to grab his hand and move it over the fabric, but also to the center. Was that a step forward or back? Did she not want him under her clothes or did she just want pressure where she needed it more? He used the palm of his hand to rub up and down and she bit him, actually bit him hard enough to hurt, on the side of his neck.

"Solluu." The sound that bubbled out was incomprehensible. He didn't know why she tried to speak when he could hear the clear _Sorry_ in her mind.

It was fine. For a moment she'd felt nothing but the thrum of her own arousal, and apparently that made her want to bite. There were worse things.

She shook her head and pushed off from his shoulders, rising up and up until her head disappeared above the water.

"What?" he asked the moment he surfaced. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing." She swam close and put her hands on either side of his face so that she could hold him still for a closed mouth kiss, their foreheads touching for a long moment, like she was trying to read his mind or letting him read hers. "I have to go."

He could have called her a coward, but the thirst was getting hard to ignore, and it was a long way across the Atlantic. He wasn't sure how she and Ginnie were going to hunt enough to keep him from being strung out. "Be quick then."

"As quick as I can be." She was looking over his shoulder to the west where there was nothing but water, and if he'd been paying more attention, he would have remembered that she always looked directly at him when they talked to one another. It was just for a moment, and maybe he couldn't be expected to catch every nuance and read a deeper meaning when he was anxious for a meal. He watched her swim the backstroke before she turned and dove northeast towards the shore of Portugal. She was thinking about the cabin as she swam away – the piano in the corner, Bat's weathervane on the roof. Not once did she let her mind slip. He watched until he couldn't tell her apart from the waves.

When he climbed over the side of the boat, he found it deserted. Mary had to hunt too – not that he wanted to think about her stalking some tourist on the beach – and Ginnie must have left to meet up with Bella.

Everything was rhythmic: the waves lapping the hull, metal clicking as the anchor's chain was pushed back and forth. He sat on the deck and almost managed to keep his mind still like Bella's for a moment.

Mary returned first, but after a waved hello, she disappeared below deck with a serious looking wrench in hand. Ginnie came next, but not with a fresh kill. She'd gotten a battered old motorboat from somewhere, and came putting up to the yacht with three coolers in front of her.

"Take them as I pass them up," she said, and he opened the last one to find it spilling over with bags of blood.

"Human?" he asked. It didn't smell human.

"Don't be daft. Horses and sheep, mostly. We need to get them into the refrigerator. And don't ask me how I got it. I'm not even going there."

She was wearing a white lab coat with a nametag that said 'Alberto Rios'.

"Isn't Alberto a man's name?"

She grabbed the tag and flipped it up so she could read it. "Huh. Fuck." _Need to get the blood in him before I tell him, and Isabella should have just told him herself, because this is not the sort of thing I promised Morfar anyway._

"Tell me what?"

"Double fuck."

"That an Old Norse saying?" he asked, and she shot him a dirty look. "What should Bella have told me?"

Ginnie looked past him to the steps that led below. She had an image of a castle in her head, and he moved from curiosity to the first sharp sting of panic. He'd seen that place in a painting Carlisle kept in his study.

"What the hell do the Volturi have to do with it?"

"Mary, get up here! I need you," Ginnie called. The last time he'd seen her look this nervous was back in India.

"Tell me."

"When Mary's here. I'll tell you, I swear." She tried to slip past him, but he yanked her back by the arm. "Mary, goddammit, come on!" she said.

"What's going on with you two?" Mary took one look at the grip Edward had on Ginnie and lay her hand over his.

"That's what I want to know," Edward said.

"Let go of my arm first."

"Not a chance."

"Both of you settle." Mary started to pry his fingers loose. "Think, Edward. If you want her to talk to you, you need to give her some space."

He let go, but stood between Ginnie and the railing. Her thoughts went back to Demetri and a little yellow car on a cobblestone street.

"She's gone to Volterra, Edward."

He plunked like a sack on the deck.

"I'm sorry, but she said she had to do this, that they needed to know they couldn't hurt you again to get to her, so when Isabella told me to come back on my own, I damn well did it, because the woman scares the hell out of me when it comes down to it. You know even Aro won't take her on, so it'll be okay, and I called grandfather while I had reception; he's going to meet us off the coast of Virginia, and you'll see, it'll be fine."

He wanted to stuff every word back in her mouth. More than that, he wanted to fling himself overboard and swim for the nearest coastline. There was a time when he would have done it, and to hell with anyone who got killed on the way. He cursed Bella for knowing him well enough to realize that he wouldn't do that now. There'd be no way to reach her without moving through the human world. Even if he knew the way and could stick to the countryside, he'd still have to get at the heart of Volterra city to find her.

Ginnie's mind was still running as fast as her mouth had been.

"When did you know?" he asked.

"Not until we were in Portugal, I swear. I guess she didn't trust me to keep it a secret. I'm terrible with secrets." She put the lid back on the closest cooler and sat down. "I think she was trying to hint though, when we had you down in the hold."

He must have looked as lost as he felt.

"With her story about the Romanians," Ginnie said. "Ivan keeping his lover and brother safe."

"What lover? What are you talking about?"

"Vladimir. Isn't that what Isabella meant when she said 'extremely close'?" She shook her head. "It doesn't matter. I was talking about the thing with Ivan keeping them hidden from Alec and Jane."

"That was supposed to make me, what? Feel okay about this?"

"Well, they're still alive, aren't they?"

"Maybe the other guy would be too, if he hadn't locked everyone away and fought by himself."

"Oh please. He had all those other relatives with him and…" She stopped. "You mean Isabella's on her own." She slid off the cooler and moved forward so she could put a hand on his shoulder. He shrugged it off. "She'll be fine. She's used to being on her own. You watch, she'll be back at the cabin in no time, and grandfather said he'll get you there and wait with you until she comes."

He shook his head. "I'm not going to the cabin."

"What do you mean?"

"I'm not."

"We can't stay here. It's not easy to find a lab with animal blood."

"Not here. I'm not waiting for her to decide to come back. I'm going to Forks."

"What the hell is Forks?"

"I remember the way Carlisle brought me. We kept to the forests. I can do it again."

"Isabella will kill me if you go off on your own."

"Then she'll kill you," he said. "She thinks she can make every decision, but I'm not going to let her. I'm going to Carlisle's." He didn't care how he sounded. He was sick to death of trying to prove he was a man. He didn't even think about what would happen if Carlisle turned him away. He jumped over the coolers and pelted down the stairs and shut himself up in the hold with every intention of staying there until the need for blood brought him back out.


	21. Forks

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Belindella for the preread on this chapter.

After a week of swimming wide circles in front of the ship, only heading back to snap at Ginnie whenever he had to raid the horse blood, Edward wasn't surprised when he spotted land before Mary. He'd been itching for the sight, but now that he had the tree line front and center, he found himself in no hurry, and he sunk beneath the dark water to head the mile back to the boat.

Ginnie was on deck with her cell phone in hand. "Grandfather's swimming out so we have help getting you to shore."

"I'm not a bomb," he said.

 _Could've fooled me._ She rolled her eyes, and he had to wonder if he looked that immature every time he did it. "Listen, Edward – "

"I'm not going to the cabin."

"Isabella could be on her way back already. How long did you think she'd need to meet with the Volturi?"

"Meet with? Are you screwing with me? It's not a conference."

"Maybe she just… " Even Ginnie had the good sense not to continue. She shrugged. "Alright, she went to make sure they never come after you again. That doesn't mean it'll get violent."

It would. She'd ripped Enkidu's head straight off despite feeling indebted to him, so how much worse would it be when Bella didn't owe the Volturi a thing?

"I need to see Carlisle." He turned and headed below deck, because it was that or jump ship if he wanted to get the last word in. And too, he didn't want Ginnie to see how much it upset him that she hadn't heard any news. Bella didn't have a phone with her, and Edward told himself that was why no one had heard from her yet. But he didn't like it. When he ran into Mary, he offered to help out, if only to focus his mind on something.

"I've dropped anchor," she said. "There isn't much to do unless the Coast Guard or some other boat comes close while we wait for your ride."

She wasn't just worried about Edward's trouble around humans. Ever since he'd spent time in the hold, he'd suspected that Mary was smuggling something in the crates down there. From what he could tell, she made her living off of it, but she didn't think about her cargo specifically, and he didn't ask what it was.

"Are you sure it's such a bad thing that Isabella's left for a while?" Mary said. "Don't get hot under the collar. I just mean that she's a lot to take. There's something about her."

"You have no idea."

"It doesn't get to you?"

"Her leaving gets to me. Her sticking Ginnie with the job of telling me the news."

Mary sighed. "You'll be alright."

"And you know this how?" He searched her thoughts with a vague hope that she had some sort of gift, but came up empty.

"Just a feeling."

"Yeah. Because feelings have been doing me a world of good lately."

"Alright, if that's how it is." She handed him some rags and a paint scraper. "You can scrub out the bilge. Don't empty the bilge water over the side when you're done. Fish don't like bleach, so there's a bucket in the hold."

She had the gall to wink at him.

It didn't take long to do the work, but it shorted out his sense of smell. Even when he heard the sound of Bat's voice and came up onto the deck, the whole world was still a sea of bleach.

"Heard you were working hard," Bat said. "Maybe the Viking love of the sea rubbed off on you." He slapped a pack of cigarettes against his palm.

Mary must have caught the scent of tobacco, because she called, "No smoking on my ship," before she made it up the stairs. She stopped when she saw Bat. "Who's this?"

"This is my grandfather," Ginnie said. Edward had never seen Ginnie look at anyone the way she did the old man. "Everyone calls him Bat, though his original name was Volündr."

"I'll stick with Bat. Hell of a lot easier to say." The odd thing was that even as Mary said that, Edward could hear her rolling the name Volündr around in her head like it was something to stow away for later. She wiped her hands on her jeans and offered a clean palm.

For a moment Bat just stood there staring, but he finally gave her hand a brief shake and said, "We should get moving. Don't want to risk someone coming to check out the boat while Edward's still on it."

"Take a cooler for him," Mary said.

With bloody picnic provisions in hand, they set out, and Bat rowed them across in the little boat. It was maybe four o'clock on a very clear night. They hadn't walked far up the beach when Bat and Ginnie grabbed his arms at the same moment.

"You alright, kid?" Bat asked.

Oddly, the 'kid' thing didn't bother him so much coming from a seventy year old man, even though he'd technically been around for a lot less time than Bella.

"Why wouldn't I be?"

"There's a woman, maybe a mile south." Bat tightened his grip.

"Can't smell anything but bleach."

"Huh. You might be on to something there."

Bat's truck was parked precariously at the top of a dune, and Edward wondered if it could be stuck. They set the cooler in the bed and piled into the front with Ginnie in the center, knees pressed against the gear shift. Bat flipped the ashtray down and lit up before putting the truck in reverse.

"I can't take you all the way to the airport to pick up your car, sweeting, not with him on board, but I'll get you a little closer."

"No," Ginnie said. "I'm sticking with you."

"You sure?"

She leaned toward Bat so that their shoulders pressed. "I'm sure, Morfar." Her thoughts turned for a moment to her apartment in Miami. Edward had no idea why she'd live in a place with that much sun, but it was clear she missed it and was only putting off her homecoming to spend time with her grandfather. That was nice, actually. It reminded him of Carlisle, and Edward wondered what kind of reception he could expect at his surrogate father's home.

He didn't have all that long to find out. Bat pushed his truck up the back roads, crossing the country like he wanted to strip the pavement from the dirt. They stopped once when they got a ticket in South Dakota (about which Bat had cursed for miles in such archaic and creative ways that Edward now had the dubious honor of knowing that skítkarl meant 'man of shit' in Old Icelandic). They stopped to hunt a few times when the woods were remote enough, and it was a relief to feel the blood come hot from the artery of a buck again. He bathed in a river while Ginnie and Bat took turns watching him so the other could use a hotel room shower. Bat brought him a bar of soap and new clothes, so he couldn't complain, even though he was now dweebed out in tan kakis and a dark red Montana Grizzlies sweatshirt.

Bat also brought news that day.

Bella had called him from a payphone, and though she'd had insufficient change, and had been cut off after about a minute, she was alive. Edward had thought he needed to know exactly what had happened and where she was headed and whether she knew yet that he wasn't waiting for her in an empty cabin, but none of it mattered now, because Bella was alive.

They were at a park near Mount St. Helens when she called.

"You sure you want to keep on to Forks?" Bat asked.

He wasn't sure at all, but going to the cabin felt wrong.

"I need to go to Forks."

"Do you really, or are you sulking?" Ginnie asked. "Because this is a long way to go just so you can make a point."

"Leave him be. It's his call," Bat told her.

"Thanks. And thank you for driving me so far out of your way."

He knew Bat helping him was really a matter of Bat helping Bella, but he was grateful just the same. Bat was thinking about her, and Edward had never seen Bella wrapped in furs on an icy shore, so it was an old image. It was a damn good look for her actually, and he asked himself again if he was doing the right thing.

Mary's face replaced Bella's in Bat's mind.

"What was with you, back on the boat anyway?" Edward asked him.

"Nothing."

"You didn't forget the mind reading thing, did you?"

"Mostly I remember that you're a pain in the ass."

"I am at that. So… Mary?"

"Don't start." Bat ran a match across a nearby rock and lit up after a few missed attempts in the breeze.

"Something about her set you off. Did you know her?"

"I don't and I won't. See if you catch me near the water again."

Despite his words, the image in Bat's head shifted, and Edward jumped back from him with a shouted, "Holy shit!" He couldn't believe what he was seeing, because Mary had never worn an outfit like that. Edward doubted she even owned something like that. "Stop! Not – Christ, you're seventy. And anyway Mary was what, like fifty when she was turned? You're an old dog."

"Shut it. I told you before, and I know your thick vampire brain remembers. I don't want anything to do with women anymore. I'll stay the hell away from her, and hopefully she'll stay hell and gone from me."

Edward wasn't going to let up, but then he remembered his own sorry life. "Yeah, alright." He could see how, if someone had warned him about the dangers of obsession beforehand, he might have steered clear of the cabin, though he was pretty sure he would have ended up there eventually.

He sat and watched the moon come up over the tops of the trees while Bat worked his way through the rest of a pack of Marlboros. When Ginnie returned from the closest hotel, nails polished, face made up, and ready for the last leg of the trip, Edward gave directions up the 101 and into Olympic National Park, then to the winding dirt road that led to Carlisle's house.

Given that his memory of every moment of his second life was perfect, there was a certain sense of familiarity in returning to any place he'd been before. That didn't stop Carlisle's driveway from feeling like both a homecoming and a reckoning. He didn't have much time to think about it. As soon as they pulled up, Edward caught unfamiliar scents through the open window, and he couldn't help the low warning growl that escaped.

"What's wrong now?" Ginnie asked.

He pointed. There were two strangers on the front porch, sitting together on a wide swing. By the time Bat told him to stay in the truck, he was already out of it. He felt his wariness spike and then get submerged beneath an odd wave of lethargy.

"Edward, it's alright." This from the small young woman who stood up but kept her hands in front of her to show him she meant no harm.

As she started to move forward, the blonde man beside her put a hand on her wrist, and whispered "Wait, Alice, he's not settled." He wanted to pin Edward, and though his thoughts made it clear he was only protecting the woman, Edward couldn't help dropping low to defend himself. Ginnie and Bat moved to either side of him, and he figured that with two Vikings on his side, he'd come out on top, even though the man who Alice thought of as her mate, Jasper, was covered in scars that made him look pretty fucking scary.

"We don't have to fight," Alice said. She imagined the five of them fighting, and then Carlisle coming through the trees.

"Where is he, where's Carlisle?"

"He's coming, Edward." Her mind was frenetic. She thought repeating his name would help calm him, but she worried that it wouldn't after all, because he would read her thoughts and know she was saying his name on purpose. It occurred to her that he would be listening now, and she thought, _Everything's fine. Carlisle can explain. We're guests here, not intruders. I thought you would be here a little later, so he went hunting._

"And Esme?" he asked.

_She's with him._

That made sense. And the fact that this woman knew he could read minds meant Carlisle must have trusted her.

"Everybody relax," Bat said. "You especially," he told Jasper. "You look twitchy. Alright. Does anyone want a cigarette?"

"Jesus, I'll take one." Ginnie pulled a lighter out of her purse.

It might have been awkward, the five of them standing around, except that Edward was preoccupied by what he could hear from the woods. Carlisle and Esme were getting close enough to read now. He caught Esme's rather personal thoughts when she noticed a tear in her dress. She was even prettier when she smiled. Carlisle took her right hand and then startled her by throwing his other arm around her waist and turning them in an impromptu waltz.

"We have to get back," she said, but she kissed him. When it looked like they were going to end up lying across the fallen log in their path, Edward turned his attention elsewhere. Their closeness didn't make him feel quite so left out and angry anymore; it couldn't now that he understood the mate bond better, but he wanted to give them some privacy. They'd have precious little of it at home if they let him stay.

Carlisle caught Edward's scent, but he and Esme were still hand in hand when they came running out from the trees. Ginnie thought something akin to, "Awww," while Bat thought, "The saps."

There was no hiding Edward's red eyes, and Carlisle noticed straight off. Edward might've thought he was angry if the man hadn't already come forward to hug him.

"You're alive," Carlisle said. _What happened? Where's Isabella? Thank God._

Their greeting lasted long minutes with both Esme and Carlisle in some kind of physical contact with him: a hand on his shoulder, a pat on his back. He'd gotten so used to Bella's touch being forbidden or intense or longed for, that he was no longer used to this easy exchange. Or maybe it was just that he'd expected some sign that they all remembered why he'd been kicked out of this house in the first place. Instead, there were a lot of questions – some of which he answered, but most of which Ginnie managed to commandeer.

"…So the wolves were just slammed to the ground, and blood was coming out of their mouths, all over their fur, and their eyes were rolling up, and the way they thrashed - like they were being electrocuted – "

"I think they get it," Edward said.

"Well anyway." Ginnie crossed her arms. "It was pretty gruesome. I had to look away."

"You had to... You weren't even sane at that point. If I recall you were clinging to Demetri and screaming about Bella and the end of the world."

She nodded and leaned toward Esme. "If you ever get the chance to meet Isabella… nothing against her, but seriously, run the other way."

"Ginnlaug!" Bat said.

"Sorry, Morfar."

Alice laughed, and Esme turn to smile at her. Edward realized that there were a lot of competing thoughts going on, and that he'd never be able to say what he wanted unless he could get some clear space in his head.

"Esme, I really need to talk to you alone," he said. "That is, if you're willing."

"Of course."

He half expected Carlisle to object, but instead he ushered everyone into the house while Edward followed Esme to the sparse woods. The trunks were thicker here than in Appalachia, and the old growth blocked out more of the sun. The forest floor was bare in places, unlike the brambled thickets that surrounded the cabin.

"I think we've come far enough," Esme said. She sat down on a rough hewn bench that hadn't been here before he'd left. In the distance, something scurried over a log, and Esme was on her feet, teeth bared in a fraction of a second.

"It's just a squirrel," Edward said. "Maybe a fox." He had to remind himself that it had only been close to a year since she'd been turned. He remembered how much worse everything had been for him then. "Your eyes aren't red anymore," he said.

She settled back onto the bench. "No, and I can't say I miss seeing that in the mirror. But your eyes are red."

"Yeah. Long story about me stuck in a sinkhole and not having much of a say in what got thrown in after me."

"I'm sorry, Edward. I feel like this is all my fault."

"What?"

"If you hadn't had to leave – "

"I threw you out a window. You don't get to apologize." He took her hand. "I can be thick headed, and it took me a while to figure out what a jerk I was, but I'm sorry I hurt you. You were trying to comfort me during one of my tantrums. Jesus, I'd been turned for a couple of years. I should've had more control than you did."

"But you were getting used to hearing other people's thoughts on top of everything else. I know you did the best you could."

"I didn't. I could have walked away instead of pushing you."

"If you could've walked away, you would have." She shook her head. "You're different now. More controlled."

"It's been a busy couple of months."

"Maybe that's it. Whatever it is, I envy you. I still get frightened over every little thing, and that's not who I want to be."

"Don't envy me too much. I killed a human and I thought I was going to die myself. It put some things in perspective."

"I know what you mean. I was… I had a hard time before the change, and my problems didn't go away when I woke up. You remember. Sometimes the idea of living forever was so claustrophobic that I felt mummified. But when you pushed me and I went through that metal, I thought that was the end. I didn't want to lose Carlisle or the life I was just starting, terrifying though it was. After Carlisle came back and brought me home from Denali, I decided I was going to really live this time around. You almost did me a favor, which is not to say that I wasn't upset with you for several weeks."

"I know."

"And then when Isabella called the house, you spoke to Carlisle, but didn't ask to speak to me."

"I wasn't sure you wanted to talk to me." In truth, Edward had still been denying that he'd done anything wrong, but now he was too ashamed to admit that to her.

"I thought you hated me for being the reason why Carlisle sent you away."

"Listen, I'm the reason I got kicked out of the house." He let go of her hand and stood up, pacing in front of the bench. "Speaking of which… I wanted to ask you first, and I completely understand if you say no, but – "

"Edward, this is your home. Of course you can stay."

"You're the mind reader now?"

"Let me guess; you're next step is to ask Carlisle."

He gave her a shaky laugh. "You're good. I think you've got the hang of it."

"It'll be fine, you know. He tries to hide it from me, because he doesn't want me to feel guilty, but he regrets the way you two parted."

Edward cocked his head to the side, listening. "Carlisle must know we're talking about him, because he's on his way out here."

He sat back down and they waited in silence. It didn't make Edward want to fidget; the comfortable quiet came from having said what needed to be said. How could that be so simple with Esme but so difficult with Bella? And what the hell was he going to do after a few days? There was no way he could stay away from Bella, but he didn't kid himself that he had the patience to wait until he was hundreds of years old and she was willing to see him as someone she could respect. She had him over a barrel, really.

"You two having a good talk?" Carlisle asked. His eyes moved back and forth between them, and Edward realized his maker was still a little worried about leaving him alone with Esme.

"Fine." Esme said. She took Edward's hand again and pulled it onto her knee.

"I was just apologizing," Edward said. "I thought about getting her a card, but they don't really make anything that covers rebar spikes through the chest."

Carlisle look startled, but then he laughed, and things seemed to get easier after that. Esme jumped in to say that Edward wanted to stay for a while.

"If it's alright with you," Edward told him.

"You're welcome here."

"Thank you. I won't let you down this time."

"I know you'll do your best not to."

"Will your other guests mind? Alice and Jasper? I know not everyone appreciates having their thoughts read."

Carlisle shook his head. "Actually, you may find their company interesting. Alice can see how decisions will turn out in the future and Jasper is able to feel and influence the emotions of others. You could learn from them about how to handle issues of privacy."

That explained Alice's vision of a possible fight, and perhaps even the lethargy he'd felt when he'd wanted to attack Jasper. He couldn't say he was comfortable with Jasper's talent, but to be fair, everyone he'd met had been pretty good about coping with his ability, so he could try to return the favor.

"And Edward, if you need to talk about anything," Carlisle said, "your friend Ginnie shared perhaps more than you would have wanted about your relationship with Isabella. I had no idea –"

"It's fine. I was going to tell you."

Leave it to Ginnie to rush in first.

Carlisle thought Edward was an unlikely choice for Bella. Hearing that made Edward's skin prickle, but this was the worst possible moment to show irritation.

"She's my mate." He tried to keep his voice even.

"And she feels that way as well?" Carlisle asked.

He could say, _She admitted it once, but then claimed the whole mate thing was a myth, so we're sort of at an impasse_. Or maybe, _She knows, but she's stubborn as hell, and you may think she's fierce, but I'm starting to suspect she's chickenshit when it comes to me._

"She's been on her own too long, and she thinks I'm too young," he said at last. That was the heart of the matter really, stripped of everything extraneous.

"There is quite an age difference between you."

"Says the three hundred and sixty-some year-old man whose mate has been a vampire for less than a year." Edward sounded touchy, but really given how he felt about the whole thing, no one should be surprised.

"Still, you must admit – "

"We're mates. Yes, I'm young, and I fly off the handle. But she's going to have to deal with me at some point."

Carlisle nodded. "Bat says she doesn't make you feel the dread the rest of us feel around her, so there must be something between you."

"Is there anything Bat and Ginnie haven't spilled?"

Carlisle started to answer, but Edward could hear rapid thoughts in the trees, and he held up his hand. "Someone's coming. Alice."

"Alice is coming?" Esme asked.

"No. I mean yes. Alice is on her way, but she wants to tell us someone's coming. A Volturi. If she'd calm down I could understand her thoughts better."

"Let's get back to the house." Carlisle took Esme's hand and pulled her up from the bench.

Once back, Edward had a hard time sorting out seven anxious minds. Jasper was throwing out words like 'perimeter' and 'flanking', while Bat and Ginnie actually looked forward to a fight. It was only when Edward was able to ask Alice to remember the image she'd seen earlier that he could to tell them what was happening.

"It's just Demetri," he said. No one was listening, so he said it louder.

"Demetri?" Ginnie looked both annoyed and pleased at once, which was not an attractive look for her.

"Why is the tracker coming here?" Carlisle asked.

"Ask Ginnie," Edward told him. "Since I can stay, and thank you again for that, I'm going to get a hot bath, my CDs and some of my own clothes.

He left them downstairs, though their thoughts followed him everywhere. He put Bach's Cello Suite Number 1 on repeat, and it helped to drown the competing voices for as long as he listened only to the notes. The very act of concentration made him feel closer to Bella, using one focus to keep his mind steady, as she did.

He realized he had no idea whether she even liked music.

He had no idea whether she missed him.

After a long soak, he went to the music room and played on the baby grand, wishing it were its battered counterpart on the other side of the country instead.

When he heard Demetri arrive, he waited for the initial surge in thoughts as Jasper felt out his mood and Alice tested his intent and Carlisle welcomed him to the house and Ginnie… She just said "Hey," and then flounced to the living room and turned on the TV.

Edward found Demetri on the porch, where he'd retreated once it was clear that Ginnie wasn't sure what to do with him.

"Tell me what happened," Edward said.

"No preamble. You get right to the point."

Edward just looked at him, eyebrows raised.

"Alright, well, I didn't return to Volterra immediately. I feel some remorse about that. After I talked Mary into stopping for you, I went to Anshi Park to see how Jane was healing. I knew Alec wouldn't move her until the wound had sealed, and with her neck being almost severed, that took more than a day."

"Not really what I want to know," Edward said.

"Right. Of course. Isabella had given me that warning, so I didn't return to Volterra until after she'd been and gone. I turned my cell phone off, planning to tell Aro that I hadn't had service when he'd – "

"Still not what I want to know."

"Fine. Well, Aro's dead."

"Was it Bella?"

"Yes."

Edward sat down on the porch steps. "What about Caius?"

"Dead."

"Marcus?"

"Alive, but only because he wasn't in the Great Hall at the time, and Afton took him to safety. Caius argued with Isabella shortly after she arrived. It got out of hand. All told, Isabella killed six. Renata, because she was right there when it all happened. Chelsea was there as well. Corin and Santiago she killed in a hallway on her way out."

Those last two were the ones who'd kidnapped him, but Edward didn't think he'd told her that, so maybe it was just a coincidence.

"Afton said she knocked down the outside door and that he'd never experienced her gift before, so he couldn't say whether it was stronger than any other time."

"It must have been." Edward said. "After all, you and I lived through it in India."

"I think you could live through it regardless, but yes, the fact that Ginnie and I are alive means we must not have felt the full force of it. In any event, everyone who didn't run was destroyed. Had Alec and Jane and I been there…"

"Who's running the coven?"

"Sulpicia tried to give orders when she returned, but so few guards came back that there wasn't much point. It took days before Afton decided it was safe to go back. And once Alec arrived, most were inclined to listen to him. I think if it's anyone, it'll be Alec. Jane has recovered and can back him." Demetri came over to sit on the far side of the same step as Edward. "Listen, I'd like to make a deal with you."

"With me?"

"I won't say anything about your resistance to Isabella's gift."

"If?"

"If you don't tell anyone that Isabella warned me about the attack. If Alec knew, nowhere on this earth would be safe for me."

"I don't really talk to Alec much anyway."

"I'm serious. I'd like to have your word." He held out his hand and Edward shook it.

"Alright, you have it."

"Isabella was unharmed, you know."

"I know. Bat, that's Ginnie's grandfather; he got a phone call from her after."

"So you knew all this?'

"I didn't get to talk to her."

Demetri sighed. "We're not either of us doing well with women lately."

"Understatement of the year."

"Are you giving up on Isabella, then?"

"It's not a matter of giving up or not giving up. She's it for me. We have to find a way to talk to one another."

"How're you planning on doing that from here?"

"No offense, but I'm not looking for relationship advice from you."

"Alright." Demetri stood and straightened his robe. "I'm going to grovel and see if I can convince Ginnie to speak with me."

Edward couldn't help but laugh. "I don't get you guys. She's not your mate."

"No, her mate is dead, and I've been around for a long time without meeting anyone I would call a mate. Sometimes you take what you can get."

Demetri went inside, and Edward fought the urge to go in as well and ask Bat to drive him back across to the east coast at 100 miles per hour. Isabella was surely home by now. Who knew how she felt about finding out that her talent was deadly after all. He wanted to be near her, but he didn't want her to think it was alright to keep him in the dark and leave him behind. Maybe he was being sullen, though that wasn't his intent. He thought he'd had it bad when he'd dealt with his mother's death and the change and reading minds and needing blood, but needing Bella was turning out to be the most confusing challenge of all.


	22. Outside / Inside

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Belindella for the pre-read on this chapter. I made a few last minute changes, so any mistakes are mine.

**PART 4**

Kicking in the Volturi's door was a kindness. The splintered wood said this was not the moment to confront Bella, and if the Volturi had heeded the warning, their meeting might have gone differently. But when it came down to primal terror, to life or second death, it seemed Caius had no flight reflex left. He and Bella exchanged only a few hushed words before he leapt.

He leapt for her throat, while Aro, on his knees, grasped at her fingers in a bid to distract her or to read her thoughts and know if she were really going to snuff him out. Whatever his reason, they both took hold of her at once, with Renata howling on the flagstones and Chelsea staggering toward the exit.

In a moment, the fear - already past the intensity she'd managed when the wolves attacked – pulsed out, smacked against the rounded walls and slipped through the cracks between stones. She tried to pull it back. It wasn't mercy but panic when she realized she couldn't rein in the raw energy.

Caius, Aro and Renata were still, and Chelsea's thrashing slowed toward a stop at the far end of the room.

Bella took a breath of stale human blood and fresh rain, and wondered how long she'd be the heart of a storm. Guards were pounding up the spiral stairs.

"Go away," she called.

She tugged her bare foot from under a body and tripped backwards into the hall. There were others there, but she didn't stop moving even when she was out in the open. Birds landed with small thumps on the ground, and the forest cleared of life before her as though she were a spreading fire. She stopped beneath a large pine, and sat cross legged on the ground for hours until she was able to settle and make her way towards the Italian shore.

::::::

Long before Bella made it to her own front door, she knew the cabin was empty. Bat had told her where Edward wanted to go. There would be no sandalwood scent, or even just the haze from Bat's cigarettes.

The copper knob was bright, splotchy green with patina, and it turned easily, but when the door swung inwards, she stayed caught in a dim memory of a long ago fire and food. The details of her mother's face were lost, but she remembered the full familiarity of that thatched hut, and then the strangeness of coming home to a cold hearth in the year after her mother died. This midnight homecoming felt strange as well, and Bella shifted from foot to foot before retreating to the back garden to see what needed watering or pruning. Aphids infested the viburnum. A fallen branch had snapped a hole in the roof of the shed, and the hoe and two spades were rusted. She pulled the branch down and worked in the dark for some time before she realized she didn't want to go into the house to get the hammer she'd need to fix the shed.

She walked around front and leaned on the cabin doorframe, looking in.

A rag lay across the kitchen tap where she'd left it the day she'd sent Edward off to call Carlisle. Hard to believe that had only been weeks ago.

"Hello?" she said, and then wondered why she'd said it.

She stepped inside. It was a mystery how this place could be just the same and yet feel alien with the addition of an upright piano. Her fingers fell on random notes. After a while the sun came up and a sliver of early light warmed a few of the keys.

"Okay," she said.

It took twenty minutes to replace the slat on the shed roof.

It took ten minutes to sweep the porch.

She set the broom aside and stood watching the sun pass over the trees until it disappeared behind them. It rose again to find her in the same place, with newly blown leaves at her feet. When the sun set, and she wished she were hungry so she could hunt… when she sat down on the roof but couldn't be still… she was caught off guard by a longing she hadn't felt since she'd patted the dirt down on the burial mound behind her long ago hut. Surprises were rare. She'd learned to treasure even the painful ones, but this sensation burned more than most.

It took ten minutes to fill a knapsack with some clothes. It took longer than she expected to run across the country. Highways and electrical towers would appear when she thought she was in the wilderness. Human scents were never far. For the first time, she let herself imagine a world of only cities, where forests were trimmed to parks and she was forced to live among buildings and lights again. The more people came together in a place, the fewer the trees, so she could only suppose they wanted it that way, and would continue to remake the world. For now, there were still enough quiet spaces that she could run most of the way without being seen.

After four days, she reached Olympic National Park. The morning air was thin and clean with pine. Beyond that, Bella caught a sweet but almost peppery sharpness. Probably a nomad. Generally they didn't come closer to investigate the source of an unsettling feeling, but instead of turning aside, this vampire headed straight for her, and Bella came face to face with a short, dark haired woman whose hands were clasped in front of her. The stranger closed her eyes for a moment, as though she had no need to protect herself.

"Hello, Isabella," she said. "Edward's fine. He's hunting with Carlisle and some of the others. I managed to not let him know you were coming, but given how Carlisle described you, I was pretty certain it was you I saw." She took a step closer. "You are Isabella, right?"

This wasn't a nomad. She was wearing a red dress, striking against her black hair, and was far too well groomed to be living out of doors. She knew Carlisle, if she were telling the truth, and knew of him if she weren't, but Bella didn't like the way she spoke in riddles.

"What do you mean, you _saw_ me?"

"Sorry, I should start at the beginning. My name is Alice Whitlock, and I'm visiting here. I saw you arriving, because I see possible futures, but if you'd changed your mind, the vision would've shifted." She rocked back and forth on her heels. "It's a little strange. You're making me feel on edge. Just enough that I keep checking the future to see if something's about to happen. It isn't. Or at least, nothing horrible. Ginnie told me a little about how you–"

"Ginnie's here?"

"She and Demetri left two days ago."

Bella felt herself relax a little. Fewer people would make this visit easier. "Carlisle said there was another newborn…"

"Oh, she's not here," Alice said. "Rosalie is staying with Irina, a friend of Carlisle's. She's more comfortable around women right now. I haven't asked, but I think… well, it doesn't matter what I think. She's not here, though I believe she will be eventually." Alice looked toward the east. "Listen, Edward's quite a way off, but once he knows you're here, nothing will keep him away, and I was hoping to talk to you first, so do you mind if we walk?"

Nothing about this woman warned of immediate danger, so Bella nodded and they turned toward the west.

"We're sort of opposites," Alice said. "I see the future, and you have a long past." They reached a small creek, and Alice sat and unbuckled her sandals, then set them side by side before dipping her feet in the water while Bella took a seat on dry ground.

"It's hard to enjoy the moment sometimes when you're tempted to check the outcome of every decision," she said. "So I like pastimes that don't have a lot of repercussions. Jasper, that's my husband, he wonders how I can spend hours arranging flowers or finding just the right thing to wear, but it's a relief to make decisions that don't matter. No need to check and see if adding lilies to a centerpiece is going to bring the wrath of hell on our heads."

"Why are you telling me this?"

"I heard Edward talking to Carlisle, something about your age difference, and I got the impression that the past was keeping you from enjoying the moment." Alice sighed. "Okay, I don't know you at all, but I've gotten to know Edward a little, and I can see his future when I look for it; sometimes he's with you, sometimes without you, flickering back and forth. I don't know which would be for the best, but I know which future Edward wants.

"So I decided to talk to you about… well, your love life, which we both know is none of my business." She smiled. "Maybe I'm just giving you a moment to relax before you meet new people. And I need to tell you about Jasper. He's at the house, and it'll help if you know that his gift is to feel what you feel."

"You think I'll upset him more than usual?"

"Not in the way you mean," Alice said. "Since Carlisle said you don't feel the fear you put out, that shouldn't be a problem." She plucked one of the thin purple flowers pushing past the stones that lined the stream and twiddled it between her fingers. "But if he feels threatened, Jasper might try to calm you. It's almost instinctual. You'll lash out if you're not expecting it. I've seen you startled, and it's not pretty. Jasper is kind and actually rather soft spoken beneath the fighter you'll meet. I promise he won't harm you unless he truly believes you're going to hurt someone he cares about."

Bella nodded. She could understand that sentiment.

Alice swung her sandal straps from one hand and crossed over to Bella. "I'm not sure if you're up for a new friend," she said, "but please know how much I respect and love Carlisle and Esme. If nothing else, we can find common ground there."

Bella nodded again. "You're staying in Washington?"

"I'd like to. Jasper prefers safety in numbers, and I feel like I've found a family. We may build a home near Carlisle's." She tilted her head to the side and her chin came up. "Speaking of which, Edward is just getting back."

"I should get to the house then."

"You go on ahead," Alice said.

"You're staying here?"

"For a while. If you're going to say what I think you are, you'll want some privacy."

"That's not… I appreciate it."

"Of course." Alice smiled and thrust her sandals into Bella's hands. "Oh, would you mind taking these inside? The rain's awful for the leather."

It was starting to mist by the time Bella reached Carlisle's door and set the apparently precious sandals on the covered porch. Huge windows reflected the backlit clouds so that the entire front of the house looked like the sky. She lifted her hand to knock, but since Edward would have read her thoughts before she got this close, it was no surprise that the door opened before she made contact.

"Hello Carlisle," she said. "It's good to see you again."

"Isabella, come in." There was a woman behind Carlisle, but Bella didn't see Edward anywhere. A man leaned in the doorway to the kitchen, arms crossed in a posture that said he was ready but not worried. Alice hadn't said anything about her husband being riddled with the marks of old fights, but this was probably him. Though he was slender with gentle eyes, the scars told a different story. She kept track of him, even as Carlisle pulled the woman she assumed was Esme to his side.

"This is Esme Platt, Isabella, and this is our guest, Jasper Whitlock."

"It's good to meet you," Esme said. She held out her hand, but it was shaking, and she pulled it back. "Carlisle's told me a little about you. Edward talks about you of course…"

"Thank you for getting him back," Carlisle said.

"I promised I would." They were still standing just inside the door, and Bella wasn't sure what to say. She'd been so focused on getting to Edward that it hadn't occurred to her that she'd need to talk with strangers. She knew she ought to say something reassuring, especially since Esme was a newborn and seemed unsettled, but she couldn't seem to control her speech any more than her thoughts. "Is Edward… I'd like to speak to him, if you think he wouldn't mind."

"Of course," Carlisle said. He looked relieved. "Edward's just upstairs in his old room." He put a hand on Esme's shoulder, and she nodded as though he'd spoken to her.

"We're going to step out for a walk," she said.

"I don't want to chase you from your home."

"It's fine, dear."

Bella blinked at the endearment.

"We don't mind," Esme continued.

They probably didn't. People rarely chose to be close to Bella when they could go out and get soaked in the rain.

Everyone turned to Jasper, but for a long moment, he stared, unblinking. She knew a challenge when she saw it. His eyes were a dark red-gold, and she wondered if he were recently reformed, or whether he'd just slipped. She decided to look to the floor rather than stare him down, and that gesture seemed to be enough to get him moving.

"Ma'am." He nodded as he went by, as though she'd passed some test.

"I met your wife earlier," Bella said. "She's an interesting young woman. Please thank her for her advice."

Jasper looked surprised before he caught himself. She smiled and trusted him far enough to turn her back and take the stairs two at a time, leaving him behind and following sandalwood to the far door on the right. It was white, like everything else in this house, and it was closed.

Music filtered through, full and rich; someone was playing the piano in his room, but it didn't sound like Edward's style, and she couldn't feel the vibration through the floorboards. It must have been a recording, though it was nothing like the tin sound that whined from the one crackling speaker on her radio. Hard to believe Edward was in the next room, though scents never lied.

She made a fist and tapped it on the door. It was a bit of theatre – obviously Edward knew she was here, but she wasn't sure of her role, so she did her part and knocked.

"Come in."

For one ridiculous second, she expected to find the door locked, but the flat handle pressed down, and the door opened to show her Edward – not at the piano, but lying on his back on a thick white carpet with both hands tucked behind his head. He couldn't have found a less defensive position if he'd tried.

"What do I have to be defensive about?" he asked, but he did sit up and turn to face her.

"Nothing."

He was dressed in jeans and a black shirt that made him seem to jump out against the pale floor. The top two buttons were undone, and she wanted to slip her hand through to the base of his neck, his collar bone, so that this would feel real. She was nervous now, and she wondered if it made her harder to be around.

"No, not for me."

He picked up a remote controller like the one Ginnie had used in the hotel room in India, and the rolling notes of the piano grew quiet.

This was the room Edward had missed, and she was curious to see what it had to offer, but she couldn't take her eyes off of him.

He smiled, but then swallowed and looked away.

"I know that music," she said. "I heard it played in Paris once, not by Chopin himself, but –"

"Would you just come in and sit down?" His eyes were back on her now, and his jaw was shut tight, as though he hadn't just snapped at her.

She settled onto the floor several feet away.

"Why did you come, Bella?" he asked.

She knew better than to think of every possible answer to that question. Some would offend him, and some would embarrass her.

"I thought you were beyond embarrassment," he said.

"No, not anymore."

She fiddled with the thick fibers in his rug. The friction was dry and soft, and she felt it on her fingertips, let it be the sole focus of her attention until her nervous energy started to calm. She didn't want fear to bleed out and reach Carlisle somewhere beyond the house, especially after what had happened in Volterra.

"I heard about the Volturi," Edward said. "Are you okay?" His voice had gone soft, the impatience of a moment before gone.

"Alice told you?"

"No, Demetri."

 _Of course._ Demetri would have been in contact with the survivors.

"You met Alice?" Edward asked.

"She stopped me several miles out from the house."

He slapped a hand on his knee. "I knew it! She's been strange for days and kept humming the theme to _Bonanza_ until I went out of my way to avoid her, which, now that I think of it, is what she wanted." He sighed. "She reminds me of Ginnie."

"She's more introspective than Ginnie."

"Maybe," Edward mumbled. "You didn't say you're okay with what happened in Volterra, and I'll be damned if I can tell."

"I'm fine."

"Well that was convincing."

"I don't know how to explain. I was terrified to find I have more power than I thought, but I'm not sorry about what happened. I've always been practical. If I can be of help, I help, and if I'm threatened, I defend myself. And if there's something I need…" But she wasn't sure how to finish that. She needed something she couldn't take. She had to ask for it, and if she thought too much about that, she might grow nervous again. _Calm. Be calm_ , she told herself.

They sat in silence, and she suspected he was waiting for some thought of hers to let him know what she wanted.

"You're the one who left," he said.

She shook her head. He was probably right, but to her it seemed the other way around.

"You didn't really expect me to go back to the cabin after you let Ginnie give me the news?"

 _Yes._ "Maybe."

"I had every right to be angry."

"What would you have done if I'd told you, Edward? There we were, swimming together, and if I'd said, 'I have to go to Volterra,' what would you have done?"

"I don't know, you didn't give me that choice." He stood up and paced in front of a long, white bookcase. "I guess I would have talked you out of it. I wouldn't have followed you to the shore and wiped out the local population, if that's what you were worried about."

"I'll tell you what I think," Bella said. She closed her eyes, so he could see it just as she'd imagined it. "You would have told me not to go. If you made a move to stop me, grabbed my arm or pulled me under, I might have used my ability, or tried to." She remembered the expression on his face the first day, when she'd told him never to touch her again. He'd been shaking then, and wouldn't meet her eyes. "I don't know how much you feel it anymore, but I don't want to find out. If I'd told you everything, there would have been no way around it. I had to leave." He huffed out a breath that startled her eyes open. "What?"

"And you think I'm stubborn."

"Edward, they came to my home; they attacked you, dragged you away, left you in the care of a werewolf who could've lost control at any moment. Do you think I could just let that pass without –"

"All of that happened to me. I should have had some say in how it was handled."

How to explain that he was right, but that it wasn't in her nature to let a threat hang over her head when it could be dealt with.

"Did I say not to deal with it? No. I said it wasn't alright for you to decide how best to protect me without even telling me what you were going to do."

"No, I… Does it help that I'm sorry, even though I don't know what I'd do if I had to make the same decision again?"

"Your only justification is that you were going to Volterra to kill those bastards no matter what I said, so it was easier to not let me speak."

"I didn't mean to kill them."

Edward knelt in front of her.

"You can't think I care that they're dead."

She watched his face for some sign of fear, but couldn't find it. "Not that they're dead, but that I slaughtered them."

"We're all of us deadly," he whispered. "Just because you didn't use your hands…"

"And if that fear gets away from me again?"

"Santiago wanted to kill me, and I got a pretty clear idea of what Enkidu must have been like too. There are killers, and they use whatever weapons they have at hand, but you're not like that. It was self defense."

"Was it? I went to see them."

"C'mon, Bella. I know you understand the difference between yourself and someone who wants to kill." He tapped a finger to the side of his head. "I can read between the words, remember?"

"If you can read me that well, then you must know why I'm here."

He sat back on his heels and looked at her for a long moment.

"I don't know unless you think about it. And it seems like there are a lot of reasons, and even you don't know the one that led you here."

"I do know."

"So tell me, already."

"You make it sound easy."

He sighed. "Just think about it then, if you can't get it into words, and I'll make sense of it."

"No, if I can't say the words, I don't deserve an answer." She took a few long breaths, and Edward put a hand on her knee.

"The thing is," she said, "I think you've done something, changed something. I went home, but it didn't feel like home. I know you don't like to hear about my age, but the longer I live, the more I realize what we mean when we talk about time stretching on forever. I've lived on my own with no complaint, and I've gotten used to empty rooms and quiet forests. I thought I understood them, but when I came home and you weren't there… What have you done? Because I can't be happy living the life I've lived for so long, but I don't know how to live another way."

"That's your question? _What have I done?_ " He sounded almost angry, and she tried not to let it throw her.

"That's not…" She took one last breath and let go of every distraction. "I came to see what you want from me. I came to surrender. I came to ask if you'll come and live with me again, because I don't seem to be able to go on by myself now that I know what it's like to have you with me."

She realized her hand was tapping on the floor. He'd wanted control, and he had it now. The fact that he was young and changeable still, the fact that he might regret decisions made in these early days – it was all true, but what could she do if she wasn't able to be without him. He could ask for anything, and she'd give it if it meant he'd spend his time with her.

He reached down and took her hand and stilled it in his own.

"Bella, how can you be so… how can you know so much about so many things and not know that this, you and me, this isn't a war?"

"No, but I –"

"You say I go back and forth, but you've gone from making my decisions for me, to telling me that I can ask for anything. And let's face it, I may not be throwing people around any more, but even I don't think I'm ready to have everything my way. Not by a long shot." He leaned in and kissed her, soft and sweet, just his lips pressed for a second to hers. "Stop worrying. I'll come back with you."

"Why?"

"I was going to come find you before the week was out. You're not the only one who can't take the separation."

She could have waited. He would have come to her anyway.

"Hey," he said. "Stop thinking like a general. Neither of us has the upper hand when we both have something to lose."

He looked so sure. She felt a frisson run through her when she realized she was looking at the man that he could be, free from the moods and the worst of the bloodlust. "Where do you get all this?"

"I've watched Carlisle and Esme. It's like learning from the masters."

She didn't know whether to be honest now. It seemed like a bad idea.

"Since you're all about giving me what I want, I'll take honesty," he said.

"I don't know if I can be what you need. I'm not good with people."

"You're just out of practice."

"I still think you should have more than two years to get used to this life."

"But you didn't come all the way across the country to tell me that."

"No." She sighed. "I came to give in."

He brought her hand to his mouth and pressed his lips to her knuckles. "It's not exactly, 'Oh God, Edward I want you like mad,' but it's a start."


	23. Copper / Tin

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to Belindella for the pre-read on this final chapter; any mistakes are mine.

The snow made everything quiet, twigs buried too deep to be snapped and echoes muffled. A few repeated notes split the silence while Edward sat composing. Bella could hear his music now, fading as she moved north. She wouldn't go far, but she still preferred to hunt alone, and though she was sure he'd rather be out here with her, he'd spent the last few months proving he could let the little things go.

Her feet packed the dry snow tight, and more of it collapsed onto her toes. Catching a scent in the crisp air, she stopped. Deer. They'd started venturing closer to the cabin lately, and once, she'd seen finches on the roof.

"Looks like you're not scaring the birds off today," Edward had said.

"Strange, isn't it?"

"Not really. I can tell your mood by how much wildlife is around."

"Don't you just read my mind?"

He'd given her a wry smile. "Yeah, right. I stand a better chance of figuring you out through birdsong."

He'd probably been right about her moods. Now the deer had yet to notice her as they searched for growth that pushed past the drifted snow, and she was able to still her mind and pull a buck down. Its last breath was warm and misty in the cold air. She sat with the body as it cooled and then headed back, stopping once to free a rabbit from a snare. It kicked its hind feet against her and took off like a chariot. She'd need to keep an eye out for the hunter who'd set the traps. If he returned to check them at the wrong time he could find himself on the deadly side of Edward's hunt.

The vampire in question (she tried not to think 'newborn'; he didn't like the word and she was proving that she could let the small things go as well) looked anything but deadly in a buttoned white shirt with his head bent down and his tongue just visible as he concentrated, scribbling notes onto sheet music.

"My tongue is not hanging out," he said without looking up.

"My mistake."

She went over and put a hand to his shoulder, though at some point she'd stop needing the tangible proof that he was here.

"As if I mind." After he turned on the bench so that she was framed between his knees, he tugged at the hem of her shirt.

She knew what he was asking. If he had his way, she'd probably do without a shirt most of the time.

"Most? You clearly don't know me," he said, tugging again to pull her closer. "It's not my fault that you don't get the miracle of breasts." He pressed his face against her stomach and nuzzled her shirt. "Besides, you don't mind."

She didn't, really. Sex was a force like the sprouting fields and the spring sunshine, and though in their case it couldn't lead to life, it was still a part of nature. Much less complicated than vows and boundaries and half formed promises. To Edward, promises were somehow tangled with sex, but then he'd grown up in another time. Modern sex seemed to have rules and hidden meanings that were beyond her.

He sighed. "Yes, it's all too complicated. Can I peel this shirt off you now?"

He lifted it up and over her head without waiting for an answer, and she raised her arms to help.

"God, you're gorgeous."

He always said it like it was a surprise.

"Not a surprise. More like a revelation every time."

"Aren't they the same?" she asked.

He groaned and tugged on her wrists, pulling her down to the floor as he tumbled forward and settled on top of her, knees on either side of her hips.

"How did I manage without these for so long," he said, cupping her breasts and dragging a thumb across each nipple. When he leaned down and took a deep breath just above her skin, his lips pressed against her so that her flesh muffled his faint susurrations of, "Verbena," and, "Always want." Bella slid her hand to the back of his neck and scratched with blunt nails at the short, soft hairs there. It made him tilt his head back, baring his throat for her. She didn't know why it did something to her, the mixed signals of having his throat offered while he held her down, but she shifted her thighs apart within the space between his knees.

His smile bordered on the predatory. "You like that," he said.

"I like that."

He pounced in his pleasure at having learned something new, small bites on one shoulder and the other. So easy to please, in this way at least, and she wanted to tug her skirt higher and lift up as he entered her, or maybe they would draw out anticipation until it hurt.

"Which?" he asked.

He was panting, and that decided her. "Fast now, slow later."

When he fit his knees between her thighs, pushing them even further, she drew her legs up so her bare feet were flat on the wooden floor where the chess board had been smudged away. He had to lean back and fumble with the button on his jeans, but she didn't help, just enjoyed him scrambling out of his clothes, half standing and hopping on one leg. Then he was back, sliding her skirt the rest of the way up and digging his thumbs into her hips. She reached down to guide him in when he pushed against her, letting her shoulder blades hit the floor and slide. If putting her mouth on him had been about giving, then this expressed her willingness to receive.

"I want you to…" he said before dropping down to his elbows and pressing his face to her shoulder, moving in rough rhythm, his hipbones kneading her skin on the down stroke while she dug her heels into the firm, warm place where rounded flesh met his thighs. She kept her breath slow, didn't want it to distract her from the sensation of their rocking against the floor and one another. He moved differently, pushing as hard as he could, sending them half way across the room, and she didn't know what this fierceness meant.

"You," he said.

He might not have known he'd spoken. His eyes were closed, his lips tight in concentration. Whatever he felt, she thought she was giving it back to him, lifting, growling, denting the boards with her head even after she'd come and he was still pushing them toward the far wall, relentless until he came silently, strung taut above her, suspended for the longest time before collapsing, boneless and sprawled, still inside, the weight of his shoulder on her forehead, his hipbones shifting even now in lazy circles against her.

"Am I crushing you?"

Her thought was clear and immediate.

"Good," he said. "I didn't mean to get carried away. I might have been a little excited by the thought of you on the hunt."

She would've told him how contented she was if he didn't already know.

He brushed his face back and forth on the top of her head as though marking her with scent like a cat.

"Why have you always compared me to animals?" he asked. "And anyway, make up your mind. Am I a wolf, a deer or a cat?"

"You're many things." And then to be playful, she let her mind wander.

He popped up on his elbows and stared down. "Did you just picture a… what was that… a chipmunk?"

"You puff your cheeks when you're irritated."

He shook his head, but then slid back and out of her so he could duck down to place one hard kiss against her breast. "Can I just say that it's scary when you get a sense of humor."

"Yes," she said. "I'm terrifying."

She watched the contortions as he tried not to laugh, but then it burst out of him, and the rumble passed through his skin to hers before he pushed back onto his heels and stood up.

"I should start getting ready."

"What is there to do?"

"I'm putting lights on the trees. The battery powered ones Alice sent."

Edward had been calling Carlisle or Esme and asking them to send something from his room or a store, and Bella would put on boots and run forty miles to collect these gifts from a post office box Bat had set up. The lights – tree decorations related to the birth of Christ – were a little different. They'd arrived a few days after he'd decided he wanted them, along with a note that said, "We'd all love to come. Looking forward to it."

He hadn't invited Carlisle and the rest until afterwards, but he must have wanted to, since Alice had seen it.

"Should I help?" Bella asked as she followed him outside.

"I've got it." He looked at the sky. "It's maybe two o'clock. You could check for a package I'm expecting."

"Alright."

"And don't open it."

"Do I ever?"

It was only as he started out into the snow, lights in hand, that she realized he hadn't put on any clothes.

"Watch out for pine needles," she called.

He turned and walked backwards, saw in her mind that he was nearing a fallen log, and stepped lightly over it. "Impervious, remember?"

"If you say so."

She took a shower and then dressed as though the weather mattered. The town was covered in red and green lights, and the post office was shoulder to shoulder with warm bodies. She used her key to unlock Edward's box and didn't have to speak to anyone. It was a small package, addressed to Bartholomew Strand as they all were, but this one was _from_ Bat as well. She tucked it in her pocket and made the trip home.

When she reached the cabin, Edward was gone. Though she knew hunger had probably driven him to hunt and that the Volturi weren't likely to be organized or foolish enough to strike again soon, it left her uneasy. Three trees had been draped in white cords, and the doorframe and two porch posts were similarly wrapped. A switch at the end of the cord on the door let her turn that one on, and it lit up white.

She heard Edward, then caught his scent, then saw him, dressed now in jeans and the Montana Grizzlies sweatshirt.

"Hey, don't run the batteries down. Alice didn't send extra." He shook his head. "Looking to the future my ass. They'll only last a few hours."

"You wish you had electricity."

"It wouldn't hurt to have a computer here."

She didn't think she could have electric run out this far, and she didn't want to ask Bat to deal with it and pay the bills.

"I have some money, you know," he said.

It wasn't just that. He'd want to see the world, make friends and allies of others who couldn't be comfortable around Bella for long.

"Most people aren't comfortable with having their minds read either." He walked up, and she caught the scent of deer's blood as he kissed her forehead. "I'm not unhappy here. Did I get mail?"

"Just this." She gave him the padded envelope, and he smiled.

"You didn't press on it, try to figure out what it was?"

He was truly strange sometimes.

"Get out of all this," he said, waving a hand at her clothes. "And for this... Maybe put on that green dress you have?"

She wanted the boots off anyway, and she left them in a puddle on the porch until she could clean them. The sundress was one of about ten things she wore most of the time, lightweight and easy to move in… and now apparently a favorite of Edward's.

She found him downstairs, pacing. His moods still sometimes sent him into edgy territory, so she took it easy on him, keeping her own movements slow and precise.

"Stop it, I'm not freaking out." He stood still and turned to her. "Maybe I am, but not like that."

"Alright."

"I have something for you, and I want to get this right. I'll probably fuck – sorry – it up, but if, if you… Take a seat on the bench here."

His uncertainty was probably a bad sign, but she sat down and gave him an expectant look.

"This could have gone a couple of ways. I have this ring of my mother's and I thought about giving it to you, but it makes me think about her. She expected me to fill this gap left when my father died, take care of things, drive her places… but I was the one who insisted we drive home even though the roads were icy, and then Carlisle found us when it was too late for her." He shook his head. "That's not the point. There's the pendant you wore. I kept it after the fight, I think because of Enkidu actually…"

She didn't know where he was going, but she hoped it would make more sense to her before the end. After wearing that dagger for most of her existence, she'd come to a point where she didn't want to be reminded anymore of what she once was.

"That's the thing. I didn't think you'd want to keep it, but I put it in my pocket because of what Enkidu said about bronze – the way copper is soft, but that softness makes the brittle tin stronger, and together they make bronze."

"I'm sorry, I don't – "

"Understand, yeah I know. I'm trying to explain." He started to pace again. "I know you think I make you soft. Even if I do, maybe it's not such a bad thing." He fingered the envelope and tipped it sideways so something fell into his palm. "Bat made these. He melted down the bronze and my mother's ring."

There were two rings in his hand. Both were plain, polished to a smooth, flat surface. She leaned forward but kept her hands at her side.

"You don't have to look at them like you want to poke them with a stick," he said.

She caught his eye. "What does it mean?"

"What?"

"Rings. I'm not so backwards that I don't know they're a promise that might bind you. Marriage has been around a long time, Edward."

"I just thought…" He closed his hand in a fist. "I thought… You know what, it doesn't matter what I thought." He'd gone out the front door so fast that she was still leaning forward toward the empty space.

She tried not to feel like she'd let him down. She washed the already clean kitchen counter down, giving herself a moment with only cool water and soap, settling herself, giving him time to settle. There was no mistaking where he was as the thumping passed back and forth over her head. After a few minutes she jumped up on the roof and sat down well outside of his path. He continued to pace, and she waited, listening as the irregular beat of his footfalls slowed and came closer. He sat next to her, their knees bumping.

"Where's the crime in a promise?" he asked. His voice was surprisingly subdued. "Won't you admit you want to be with me?"

"I know you understand why I touch you so often," Bella said, "and I did follow you to Forks."

"To tell me you're stuck with me because you can't stand an empty house. That's not the same as wanting me."

She put her hand on his knee. "Want is for things you can do without. If this was about want alone, we wouldn't be here. Edward, I feel like I need you. I know you must be able to get some idea of how bewildering, how beautiful and terrifying that is for me. I don't remember a time when I needed anything but blood. Blood is everywhere for the taking, but to need someone else, to need you more than anything…"

"Which is why you shouldn't look shocked when I try to show you I'm not going anywhere."

"If you regret it when you're tired of being out here on our own –"

"For fuck's sake, it's not like you can't go into the world if you want, and Carlisle was doing alright around you at the house. We'll see how it goes when they come here."

"It won't be easy."

"It's just a visit, and anyway they're bringing tents so if they want to have time to themselves without mind reading and fear, they can. Plus the birds on the roof were a good sign, right? Maybe it'll be better."

"Edward, the fear isn't going to just go away. If that's what you're counting on – "

"One thing. One. I just want you to believe me when I say I'm not going anywhere without you."

She closed her eyes and reached for his hand. "I am trying."

"Okay," he said, but he was looking away.

"Give me the ring."

"What?"

"I'll wear it."

"No, not like that. Not because I guilted you into it."

"No one guilts me into anything. Bat made one of them for me, right? Let me see it again."

For a long moment she thought he wasn't going to let her, but then he fumbled in his pocket.

"It felt odd asking him to melt down a four thousand year-old artifact," he said, "but Bat didn't care." He passed the smaller ring across. "I was going to…"

When he didn't finish, she didn't ask him what he had planned. She turned the ring over, then tried it on different fingers until it fit the middle one.

"I didn't know your size," he said, quiet again. He was staring at her hand.

"It's beautiful."

"If you're just wearing it to make me happy…"

"There are few things in this world worth more than the sight of you happy, Edward." She sighed. "I'm already neck deep anyway. If you need to leave this place one day, I'll follow."

He took her hand again. His fingers were light and smooth as they tapped against hers. The wind blew snow through the air, and it made small, damp spots on her sundress.

"That's enough, then," he said. "I'll just stick around until the summer, and, you know, when the cabin has to be rebuilt, and later when the mountain behind the place starts to wear down and the continents shift into one big mass of land."

She smiled despite herself. "And the sun burns out, and there's no more blood."

"Right," he said. "Until then."


End file.
